
Class 

Book 

CopigM?. 



CfiMElGRT DEPOSIT. 



' est, without <x corresponding good manner* is 

like afiovc.r uiihov.l perfume or a tree without leaves.'' 



Wkxm&tt 



TM AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS 

A STUDY OF THE 

USAGES, LAWS, AND OBSERVANCES 

WHICH GOVERN INTERCOURSE IN THE BEST 
CHICLES OF AMERICAN SOCIETY 



BY ^^ 

MRS. W. E. W. SHERWOOD 



NEW YORK 

GEORGE ROUTLEDGE & 

9 Lafayette Place 










6 cj,o3^^' 



Copyright, 1 
By Joseph L. Bi.amii 



PUBLISHER'S PREFACE. 



fl^HE publisher desires to indulge in a word of 
JL self-gratulation. The first edition of " The 
American Code of Manners" sold so rapidly 
that the momentum was felt in subsequent 
orders, and the present large edition was nearly 
all called for before the paper was manufactured 
on which it is printed. New editions will speedily 
follow. This popularity is not wholly attributed 
to its comprehensiveness and accuracy, but also 
to the freshness and picturesqueness of the style 
in which the author has presented lessons in 
etiquette. The " Code " is not a dry formulary 
of rigid rules, but an entertaining treatise which 
may be read with interest by anybody. The fact 
that it is clad in the warm tissues of human sym- 
pathy does not make it the less trustworthy, and 
its cordial reception by the press and the people 
of the country stamps it as the national authority 
on the themes of which it treats. 



PREFACE. 



THE editor of The Ameeican, like many 
another editor of a fashionable journal, 
has been for some time the recipient of in- 
numerable letters, all of which have for their 
burden the request that he will enlighten the 
writers as to some vexed question of etiquette. 
These letters come from young ladies in the 
West and East ; from young housekeepers who 
are beginning, far from the great cities, the first 
arduous attempts at dinner-giving ; from young 
men who are rising in the world, and who are 
beginning to aspire toward that knowledge of 
society from which they have been debarred by 
a youth of industry : from elderly people, to 
whom fortune has come late, but whose children 
begin to wish to know how to take their places 
in the gay world ; from all parts of the country, 
in fact, come these letters, too many of them to 
be answered individually. Therefore, in order 
not to ignore them, but to answer them collect- 
ively, he has caused to be written a series of 



ii. PREFACE. 

articles, called "The American Code of Man- 
ners," which he now collects into a book, hoping 
that, by this means, his many correspondents may 
be answered, or, at least, assured that he is not 
indifferent to their requests. The most that can 
be claimed for this book is, that it is not the 
result of either ignorance or inexperience. It 
has not been written hastily or without some 
thought. Many, indeed all, well-known books 
of etiquette have been carefully read and con- 
sulted by the writer, much good advice has 
been asked and taken, and yet, no doubt, it is 
still very far from being what the writer would 
fain have made it — an unerring guide to good 
manners. 

Books of etiquette may be divided into three 
classes — those which are written by people who 
know nothing of society, or who, at best, have only 
been permitted a glimpse of its coarser manifesta- 
tions at a watering-place ; or by those who seek to 
avenge their anger at not having been admitted 
to the arena, by abusing it ; or those which are 
written by people who know so mu-m of society, 
that they forget the steps by which they have 
risen, and who fail, as some grammarians do, tc 



PREFACE. ill. 

give the learner the first principle, without which 
all subsequent teaching is in vain. 

Many books of etiquette are as useless as Ollen- 
dorff 's French Grammar, which gives the scholar 
phrases which he can never use, as u Have you the 
cotton nightcap of the shoemaker," instead of 
telling him how to ask for his dinner, or teaching 
him how to form a sentence. The experts of 
society are, on the contrary, as certainly skilled 
in the laws which govern that great world as are 
the officers of the army in the regulation code. 
Officers of the army know not alone the art of 
war, but they know the etiquette of the camp — the 
proper dress, the salute due to each officer. It is 
a study. No man can enter the army from the 
ranks of civil life, without committing some 
flagrant solecism which, to a regularly-educated 
officer, would be impossible. 

So with the uninformed writers upon fashion 
—their errors are endless and ridiculous. Nor 
would we claim that a book of etiquette can 
be written which shall be perfect, even by an ex- 
pert ; for etiquette is cumulative, changeful and 
uncertain. " The fashion of this world passeth 
away." We can, at best, but remotely fix the 



JV. PREFACE. 

manners of the time we live in ; people differ 
about trifles. The manners of the West are not 
the manners of the East. There will never be a 
faultless code of manners written, although it 
may be spoken, understood and felt. We have 
a thousand refinements and fashions now which 
were to our ancestors unknown. We have lost, 
too, much which they had gained. Our hours, 
dress, houses, are vastly different from theirs. 
Their bows and courtesies were better than ours, 
and our children's children, again, will have an- 
other set of manners and customs differing from 
ours. But for the moment, we have done the 
best we can to help those who wish to inquire 
into the etiquette of our best society. We have 
hinted at some national mistakes in the last few 
chapters, for no one can learn anything until he 
has been told wherein he is wrong ; and, in some 
respects, the young American is very wrong. 

The mischievous tendencies of our society are 
many, and always tend to lower the tone of good 
manners. The vulgar worship of wealth, the 
imitating of foreign vices and follies, contempt of 
the domestic virtues, impoliteness of young men, 
and the fast and immodest manners of young 



PREFACE. T. 

women, should all be taken into consideration in 
the efforts which some well-intentioned people 
are making to introduce a perfect American 
Code of Manners. Until these faults are wholly 
mended, we need never hope to have an elegant 
society. The aristocratic code in Europe retains 
always a certain semblance of decency, no matter 
how dissolute and vicious society may be. With 
us, the manners of our people must proceed 
from their morals ; and, as we have no queen, 
no court, no nobility, to set our fashions, we must 
set them ourselves. 

Hoping that this little book will answer some 
doubts and solve some problems ; that it will 
encourage the modest ?„nd rebuke the rude ; that 
it will, at least, write its initial motto on some 
refined and questioning natures, we offer it as a 
tribute to that ideal society which shall be when 
the American Code of Manners is the expression 
of an American code of morals, as high, as true, as 
unselfish and as courteous as that last speech of 
Sir Philip Sydney, on the battle-field, to the dying 
soldier, when he gave him his cup of cold water : 
" Take it, my friend ; thy necessities are greater 
than mine." 




VI. % V PKEFACE. 

I 

Ikjnay almost be .said that politeness is a fo?- 
getfmness of self, a recognition of the rights of 
othe|s ; and yet so indefinable is manner, so 
indescribable is that grace, that aroma of good 
society, which comes from a long and intimate 
knowledge of the customs and the conversation 
of educated, refined and polished people, that any 
attempt to define the exact shade of demeanor 
which should be assumed, in order to fit a person 
to enter into it, would be like attempting to draw 
the^shape of the wings of the wind, or to define 
the warmth and the size of the sunbeams. 

t^ood manners and a knowledge of correct eti- 
quette must, therefore, depend largely upon the 
learner. The teacher can do but little. A few 
certain rules there are, and they are plainly stated 
in this book. A few general principles — certain 
gulfs to be avoided, certain hills to climb, the gen- 
eral geography of etiquette — have been pointed 
out ; but the quiet by-ways and lovely flowered 
lanes which lead into the heart of the best society — 
these must be explored, always, by the light of 
such lantern^ as tact, sense, perseverance, and an. 
interest in the subject. 

The Author. 



CONTENTS. 



PAGES 

INTRODUCTORY 7 to 10 

A New Departure — A Distinctive Class — Society a 
Convention — Marie Antoinette— The Polite Man 
the Firmest— The Enfranchised Woman— Woman 
makes Etiquette— Chivalry of American Men— Our 
Young Countrywomen Abroad— A Spoiled Child- 
Respect for Those in Authority— A President's 
Reception— Solecisms — Unconscious Solecisms- 
Anecdote of General Jackson— American Etiquette 
Not Slavish. 

CHAPTER 1 20 to 31 

The Young Man Who Desires to Enter » 
Society. 
Old Story of George the Fourth— Young Man from 
the Pla ns— The Necessity of Letters of Introduc- 



tion — Gentlemen's Evening Dress— The l*rjiaee of 
Wales — The Care of the Hand — Rings-^BH^a4re 
Party — Eastern and Western EtiquetbiftHrerinng' 
Dress— Neatness— Driving Out— The -Hgpr^vement 
of Mind— Clubs— Sir Walter Raleigli-| The Proper 
Form of a Note. 




» 






CHAPTER II..... 

A Young Lady's ENjj^HHfarc^SociETY. 
Dresses from Paris— Clgj^Bptlfe- T>J^etings^-A Presi^** - ^ 
dent's Wife—" Ees^|%Tir Parents"— 1 Young^,* 
Schoolmistress— igramthern Lady— A Chaperon—" 
French ProvejjjjpTho.. Complexion— Strong Bfer- 
fumes— ClearJppIs the'Foundation of Elegances- 
Cold and WJ&m Baths-Tiealth— The Mother First 
in Everytbpg— An English- Governess— A Sj)anis4i * 
Duennalfi Tri^,Clmpero«^Inviting People to 



First 



PTer Own Manners — Lord | 









l 



V1U. CONTENTS. 

Houghton— The Voice, Not Too Loud— At the The- 
atre — Love and Marriage — Respecting a Real— In- 
troducing a Daughter— The Etiquette of the Ball- 
room. 



CHAPTER III 45 to 57 

A Young Couple on their Entrance into 
Society. 

Bringing a Young Lady from Another City— At Sea — 
How to Begin— The Crucial Test— A Jaded Man of 
Fashion — The Second Danger — Push — Mrs. Leo 
Hunter— "If She is Wise"— Sending Cards— Din- 
ners — Evening Receptions — A Young Married 
Woman— A Foolish Fear— Patience as a Handmaid 
— Not Ashamed of Poverty — A Young Couple Too 
Devoted in Public— The Duty of Yv r riting Notes— 
The Husband's Duty— Butterflies and Bees— Good 
Management — The Duties of a Y'oung Couple to 
Older People. 



CHAPTER IV 58 to 70 

Dinners Large and Small — their Eti- 
quette, Number of Courses and Limita- 
tions. 

Importance of Dinner Engagements — Form of Card 
and Acceptance— "R. S. Y. P : '— A Good Dinner 
Giver — Dinners Better Cooked at Home — Hiring 
Waiters— Gas, Candles, L&mps— Composure — Con- 
genial Company— The Essentials of a Perfect Din- 
ner—The Grecian Vase. 



CHAPTER 7 71 to 82 

State Din. ters, Formal Dinners and Fa- 
mous Dinners. 

The Russian Din ler — General Washington — A Splen- 
did Picture— Ti e Host Enters First —How to F/se 
Napkin and Fork— Customs in Germany— The 
Epergne — Flowe/s— A Round Table — Five Minutes 
Grace for the Tai 1y— A Boutonniere and Card— To 
be Agreeable at T 'bio— Instructing Servants— The 



COS TEXTS. IX. 

Butler— The Host— Women Taught to Carve— Not 
Too Crowded Diplomatic Dinners— Colored Cooks 
—Dinner Cards— Health. 

CHAPTER VI 83 to 94 

Receptions, Teas, Luncheons. 

The Proper Dress at the Reception— Conveniences 
and Drawbacks— Form of Invitation— Cards Left 
—Tea at Four o'clock- The Departure from the 
Original Idea— Form of Card- Numerals— Young 
Gentlemen Should Make an Evening Call— Dancing 
at Day Receptions— Music— The Table— Evening 
Parties— At Homes— Reception to a Distinguished 
Person— The Pre-eminence of the Hostess— Musical 
Parties— A Sensible Reformation— The Etiquette 
of the Ball-room— Gentlemen in the Supper-room. 

CHAPTER VII 95 to 106 

Who Should Bow First'? Who Should 
Speak First? Who Should Call First? 
A Sliding Scale— Earl do Grey and Ripon— Nbuveaux 
liiches—Who Shall Bow First ?— Etiquet te in Wash- 
ington—To Get On in Society— Serene Courtesy— A 
Social Leader— Snobs— introducing People— A 
Truly Hospitable Hostess— The Etiquette of the 
Hat— Exclusiven ess— Lady Waldegrave— Cutting 
an Acquaintance— Adventurers— Social Marauders 
—The Sieve at the Door— Kind Inquiries— The 
Jeunesse Doric. 

CHAPTER VIII 107 to 118 

Conduct in a Crowd. 

A Matinee— Presence of Mind— Frankness Mistaken 
for Boldness— A Fancy Fair— Eccentricity— La dy 
Bulwer— Quarreling in Public— A Woman Chivalrous 
in Friendship— Not to Talk Too Well— The For- 
tress of Fashion— A Safety-Gauze Mask— Never 
Observe a Slight— How to Live Amid the Contests 
of Society— Be Grave and Decorous— A Salutation 
and its Language— The Manners of Young Women 
Apt to beToo Careless— The Duty of a Leader of 
Society— IN ever Advertise Your Failures. 



X. CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER IX 119 to 131 

The Etiquette of Weddings, of Calls of 
Congratulation and of Sympathy. 
The First Intimation of an Engagement— Wr on g 
Done to Young Ladies— A Premature Suimise— An 
Engagement Ring— Money an Important Factor- 
Giving of Bridal Gifts— Want of Delicacy— Silver- 
ware— Form of Card— Etiquette of the Engaged 
Pair— Bridesmaids— The Bride's Mother— The Leav- 
ing Home— Throwing the Slipper— Old Welsh Tra- 
dition—The Honeymoon— Widows' Weddings- 
Calls of Sympathy. 



CHAPTER X 132 to 145 

American Mistakes. 

The American Girl in Europe— Sardou's Uncle Sam- 
Rich Uneducated Americans in Europe— Peculi- 
arity of our Political System— Non-Conventionality 
— Ignorance of the Cobweb Wall of Etiquette — Mr. 
Motley and the Young American Heiress — All 
Americans of the Same Social Rank in the Eyes of 
Foreigners— The Innocent Women Who Shock Eu- 
rope—The American Adventuress an Original 
Type— Mrs. Henry V. Clams— The Relation of 
Mother to Daughter— An American Disability— The 
American Colony in Europe — A Clifford, a Howard, 
a Conde— Patronage— Foreigners Who Make Good 
Husbands— American Snobbery. 

CHAPTER XI 146 to 157 

Social Observances Toward Foreigners 
and Toward Our Own Great People. 
Avoiding a Slavish Imitation— The Norroy King at 
Arms— Shaking Hands— The French Princes— A 
Little Concession to Old World Etiquette— How to 
Treat the President— Notorious Lion Hunters- 
Snobs Thrusting Themselves In— Flies in Oint- 
ment—Cold Lunches and How to Make Th em- 
Morning Entertainments, Reasons Against Them— 
Giving of Titles— Never Abuse the Appearance of 
Intimacy— American Women Avoiding the Insignia 



CONTENTS. XI. 

of Rank— The Toad -stools— Find Out if Your Prince 
be Genuine— Lord Houghton— The Dean of West- 
minster. 

CHAPTER XII 158 to 169 

Young People at a Watering Place. 

Mistaking Notoriety for Fame— Bathing Presses- 
Conspicuous Dress— Flirtation— Observing Foreign- 
ers—Americans Gregarious— Each One Should be 
on Guard— Young Married Women— Flirtations of 
Married Men— Married Flirts— Excessive Liberty 
Permitted to American Youth— Too Youthful Mar- 
riages—Young Engaged Couples at a Watering 
Place— Speaking Without an Introduction— Young 
Men Should Not Push— Great Carelessness in Giving 
Letters— Mock Countesses and Undesirable Adven- 
turesses—The Bad Manners at a Watering Place- 
Scandal— Good Hotels— Newport. 

CHAPTER XIII ....170 to 181 

A Haughty Hostess. 

A Mock Dignity —Insulting Manners of Certain New 
York Women— Lady Holland— 111 Temper and Bad 
Manners— The Duties of a Hostess— An Anecdote 
from Life— A Married Lady All Powerful— Particu- 
larity of Invitations— A Strange Mistake— A Rural 
University Form— A Hostess an Enormous Social 
Power - Never Reprove Servants Before Company 
— Punctuality the Courtesy of Kings — Mrs. Early- 
bird— Mrs. Heavyfeather — English Women Charm- 
ing Hostesses— "Noblesse Oblige'"— No Instinct of 
Hospitality— Ignorance— Avoid the Vulgarity of 
Rudeness. 



CHAPTER XIY 182 to 193 

The Etiquette of Cards. 

The Alpha and Omega— A Clearing-house for Cards 
—Lady's Card — Gentleman's Card — The Etiquette 
of a First Call— Giving an Entertainment— First 
Invitations— When to Return a Call— Men Should 
Dress for Dinner and an Evening Call— Watering 



XU. CONTENTS. 

Place Etiquette— Where Cards Should be Left— 
New Year's Calls— How Cards Should be Engraved 
—A Persistent Ignoring of Rules— Betrothals in 
Europe—Calling* Hours in New York— Who to 
Leave Cards For— Sending Visiting Cards by Post- 
Where Shall Cards be Sent to a Young Couple 
Married in Church— The Card a Medium for Invi- 
tations. 



CHAPTER XV 194 to 206 

Flirtation and Increasing Fastness or 
, Manner. 

Flirtation of Married Women After Their Daughters 
are Grown Up— Fastness of -Manner— A Woman 
Improving Her Fashionable Position by Her Flirt a 
tions— Fast Girls— Short-lived Succe sses— Flirtation 
the High Road to Notoriety— Elderly Vanity— Mrs. 
Feather cap— Scrabbling for a Position— Ladies in 
the Highest Sense Professional Beauties— Result 
of Flirtatious Manners — The "Brand on the Fore- 
head "—The Ignis- Fatuus- 1 he Perfect American 
Woman— The Christian Church and the Institution 
of Chivalry— Delilah— The Rod of Empire— Talking 
Too Loud— The English Voice. 



CHAPTER XVI 20T to 218 

The Manners of Young Men. 

n ;ie Good Manners of the Best— The Englishman a 
Finer Man at Sixty— Arsene Houssaye on the 
Young Frenchman — Fop and Dandy of the Past- 
Young Men Should Study Manners— American 
Savages— A Splendid National Peculiarity— A 
Doubtful Man — Brutality of Manner — The Admira- 
ble Crichtons of To-day— Young Men Should Avoid 
Boasting— A Serious Flirtation With a Married 
Woman— A Bloodless Duel- The Valuable Addi- 
tion to Society— Enamel on Gold— Mine, cle Remusat 
—The Frank Smile— The Courteous Bow. 



CONTENTS. Xlll. 

CHAPTER XVII 219 to 229 

Real and Conventional Breeding. 

Slight Distinction Between the Two Breedings— The 
Grand Ceremonials of Court — Mr. Everett and the 
Duchess of Kent— A Gentleman at Heart— English- 
men Daring to be Rude — All American Women 
"Duchesses — " Costume de Voyageur" — Mr. Long- 
fellow— Politenesss of Italian Ladies— Talking 
Slang — Neither Real nor Conventional Ladies — The 
carefulness of the Real Gentleman— Neatness— 
Artificial Observances— Imposing Unpopular Opin- 
ions on One's Host. 

CHAPTER XVIII 230 to 241 

The Ethics or Dress. 

The Worldly Wisdom of Old Polonius— The Empress 
Eugenie— The Luxury of Queen Bess Outdone— Is 
Dress Worth the Trouble it Costs?— New Yoik 
Dressmakers— Seamstresses in the House— A Grow- 
ing Taste for Plain Clothes— Dress Made to Dignify 
the Human Body— The Ox Who Strove to Gambol 
with the Gazelle — Lord Byron — The Ethics of Dress 
Should Express Sex— The Puritan Fathers— A 
Mother Should Dress Better than Her Daughter- 
Allowing the Hah- to Become White. 



CHAPTER XIX 242 to 252 

An American Returned from Europe. 

Nationality — Britannia Ware — Green Travelers — 
No American Can Be Nationalized Abroad— The 
Question of Liveries— Beau Brummel— An Ameri- 
can Should Not Abuse His Country— The Bien, Eire 
of New York— An Affected Habit of Speech— Cow- 
per — The Good Influence ot a Returned Traveler — 
The Need of Good Servants— The Italian Marquis 
—The Collector— The Americans a Musical People 
— The Glib Talkers — A Judicious Economy — Mr. 
Ccbden— What Part of European Civilization to 

Copy. 



XIV. CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER XX 253 to 265 

The Money Marriage Market. 

Calculating Romeos — Respectable Fortune Hunters 
—Mere Adventurers— French Marriages— False Eti- 
quette of the Age — Pursuit of an Heiress in a Largo 
City— A Gilded Turveydrop— A Woman Marrying 
for Money— A Portionless Lady Sarah— Elegant 
{Synonyms for Rich Men's Vices— All Rich Marriages 
Wot Unhappy—- A Positive Moral Obligation— r i he 
Sleek Lazy Horse and the Full-blooded Racer— The 
Selfish Existence— A Coid-blooded Snob— A Rob- 
ber Baronees— Butchers in Disguise — " Please, 
dear Juliet, Give Me a Ducat "—The " MaHaye de 
Convenance." 

CHAPTER XXI 266 to 377 

Recognition and Salutation. 

"Be Careful Not to Bow Too Low"— The Quick 
Recognition— Cultivating a Manner — "ISEsprU 
d'Escalier"—A Pleasant Bow— A Poor Memory for 
Faces— The Social Barometer— A Conventional 
Bow— Genial arid Cordial Salutations and Their 
Power— To Meet One's Fate Half-way— A Stentorian 
Voice— Saluting the Dead— An Unkind Salutation 
— Captain Jackson — Kind and Polite Salutations 
at Home— The Reverse— A " Malade Imaginaire"* 
— Yankee Plainness— A Respect for Superiors. 



CHAPTER XXII 278 to 287 

The Arab Law of Hospitality. 

The Etiquette of Being a Guest— An English Country 
House— Punctuality — Arab Maxims — Respecting 
the Fireside—" Rede the Rede of the Old Roof 
Tree' 1 — Breakfast an informal Meal— Dinner and 
its Laws— Suggestions as to Subjects to be Avoided 
—The Family Dog— The Servants— Never Join in 
Family Quarrels— Self-love— Visiting, a Slavery— 
Too Independent People Cannot be Guests- 
Punctuality and Graciousness. 



CONTESTS. XV. 

CHAPTER XXIII 288 to 298 

Characteristics of Different Cities. 

Washington a Cosmopolitan Foreign City— Mrs. Fish 
—New York— Respectable Aristocracies— Philadel- 
phia and Boston— Daniel Webster— The "Athens of 
America"— Charles Calvert— Lord Baltimore— New- 
Orleans, the "Paris of America"— Adventurers- 
Predatory Arabs— Never Hastily Accept a Verbal 
Invitation— Never Trifle with a Dinner Invitation 
—Newport— A Clearing-bouse tor Cards— .Exclusive 
People— Description of New York. 



CHAPTER XXIV 299 to 3il 

The Morals of Fashion. 

The Married Flirts — What Does Fashion Mean? — 
Picking One's Way through the Excesses — Madame 
do Sevigne— The Prince of Wales— The Morals of 
Fashion— A Fashionable Charity— Making All Sorts 
of People — Noble Women of Fashion — Effete 
Young Men of Fashion— Fashion at Her Best— Nat- 
ural Powers of Fascination— The Stuff of which 
Fashion is Made— The Subtile Influence which 
Rules the World — Scott, Dickens and Byron Sub- 
ject to the Influence of Fashion. 



CHAPTER XXV 312 to 322 

Several Kinds of Exclusiveness. 

in Aristocracy of Self-made Men— Mrs. Mont Blanc 
—Mrs. Gushing Stream— Mrs. Lindenmere— Exclu- 
siveness Another Name for Snobbery— Exclusive - 
ness in Religion — Helping a Woman of Fashion— 
The Bold Ideas Govern the World— A Wise Exclu- 
siveness— Inviting Those who are Congenial— To 
Form a Salon — Nouveau Eiche — Copying English 
Insolence — Advising a Young Person Not to Choose 
His Friends from a Worldly Point of View— Objec- 
tionable Men and W^omen Getting Into Society— 
An Ideal Exclusiveness. 



XVI. CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER XXVI 323 to 334 

Breeding, Cultivation and Manners. 

Good Breeding Putting Nature Under Restraint— A 
Well-bred Woman— Bad Manners of Fashionable 
Young Men — No Cultivation — A Rich Wife — A 
" Dig" — The Age a Revolutionary One — An Admir- 
able Crichton Possible— The Fast Girl of the Period 
— The Varied Education of the Well-bred — Making 
the Heart Eight— To Have Nothing Left of a Great 
Ancestor but His Bad Manners— The Storys— The 
Astors— A Pretty " old Lady"— An "Old Gentle- 
man" — The Manners of the Past Founded on Re- 
spect for Others. 



CHAPTER XXVIT . .335 to 346 

The Duties or Americans to Society. 

The Political Embarrassment— Bardwell Slote— The 
Polished Man from Boston— The Ladies of the 
White House —Insolent Independence — Manners 
the Open Sesame— Raising the Tone of Society 
—Solecisms— Camel' s-hair Shawls and Ear-rings 
in Traveling— A Disdain of Privacy— A Social Con- 
science — Young Wives in Europe— A Quaint, Old- 
fashioned Politeness — American Manners Should 
Have Originality— The Power of an American Girl 
— ' he Belle of the Season— The Manners of the 
Old World. 

CHAPTER XXVIII 347 to 356 

The Use of Certain Words. 

A Genteel Thing" — 'I Love Melons" — American 
Use of Pronouns— Adoption of Slang— Teaching 
reclamation— Exaggeration— Reserve in Conver- 
? ation — "A Very Fine Gentleman" — The Word 
" Vulgar "—Good Manners the Garments of Every 
Day— "Thank You" and " Thanks "— " Good 
Afternoon " — A Decay in the Art of Conversation 
—Puns Should be Avoided— Reading and Good 
Taste. 



CONTENTS. XVII. 

CHAPTER XXIX 357 to 367 

DINNERS AND BREAKFASTS ONCE MORE CON- 
SIDERED. 

From Whom to Accept Invitations— Etiquette of 
Waiting, of Introducing— Good Manners at Table— 
" When Fingers and When Forks !"— Not Waiting 
for Others— Finger Bowls— American Taste for Ice 
Water— The Best Moment for Story Telling— Com- 
posure at the Table — Dejeuner a la Fourchette — 
Breakfasts at Twelve— Sunday Dinners and Teas- 
Wedding Breakfasts— Home Breakfasts— Sidney 
Smith — Morning Dress — A Formal Luncheon — Sim- 
plicity in Dress the Mark of a Gentleman. 

CHAPTER XXX 36S to 379 

Teas, High Teas and Calls. 

A Call cle Bigueur— The Freedom of Five. o'clock 
Tea— High Teas and Their Delights— A Buffet En- 
tertainment—No Formal Calls Made on Sunday— 
A Chapter on "Cards "—Practical Hints— The 
Alpha and Omega of Chivalry— The Necessity of 
Replying Quickly to Invitations — The Giving of 
Titles — Avoid Quarrels in Public — " After Supper" 
— A Lady Giving a Young Man a Chance to Get 
Away— Giving Him His Conge— Never to Intrude on 
a Tete-a-tete— Invite More People to a Bail than 
You Expect— The Conduct of Young Gentlemen 
after a First Invitation. 

CHAPTER XXXI 3S0 to 392 

A Few Last Words on Etiquette. 

Letters of Introduction— Calling Hours in Different 
Cities — Ladies 1 Dress — The French Fashion of 
Leaving Cards — Not Customary to Introduce Resi- 
dents of the Same City— The First Calls of the Sea- 
son— After a Fir it Invitation— A Gentleman Must 
Call or Send a Card Before Expecting an Invitation 
—Disrespect an L T npardonable Vulgarity— Disputed 
Points of Etiquette— A Servant's Mistakes—" When 
Maya Man Wear His Hat?"— Taking One's Hus- 
band's Arm— The Manners of the Theatre and the 
Concert-room— The Etiquette of Mourning— Con- 
gratulatory Visits. 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 



INTRODUCTORY. 

A S everything in a republic is chaotic and 
.JLJL uncertain at first — as it is, from its very 
inception, a "new departure;" as we are just 
now beginning to test the virtues and the evils of 
universal suffrage, so it is not astonishing that 
our observance of etiquette has been chaotic, 
uncertain and occasionally absurd. It would 
naturally be the last thing to right itself in a 
nation so vast as ours, with a population made 
up of every other nationality, and with that 
"glittering generality" incorporated into our 
Declaration of Independence "'that all men are 
created equal" 

For no greater mistake was ever penned than 
that last statement. A man may be born to great 
freedom as to his political opinions, but he is not 
free ; he may be equally trammeled by riches as 



8 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

by poverty. He is not the equal of some other 
man who has more brains, more health, more 
vigor than he has. The world is always full of 
inequalities. We may call it luck, or tact, or 
knack, or fate, or what we will— some people are 
always superior to some other people, and always 
will be. As we look at the world through eighteen 
Christian centuries, we see that in every capital, 
every country town, there has been a high, well- 
to-do, distinctive class, setting the fashions, hold- 
ing the power, being looked up to ; and we see, 
also, another class — those who are looking 
up. Of course, the distinctions of rank, 
title and grade are abolished in this coun- 
try. And here we have our own great 
distinction, which is that every American man 
and every American woman can, if they are edu- 
cated, refined, and know how to behave them- 
selves, enter on an equality the society of princes. 
Still the fact remains that, until they do achieve 
a certain knowledge of the rules of etiquette, 
they are not presentable in the drawing-room of a 
well-bred lady in any part of the world. 

Society is like a convention, a town meet- 
ing, a trades union, a caucus. Did it not have 



TEE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. \) 

certain rules it would relapse into chaos, and 
those rules are, by common consent, called by one 
generic term —Etiquette. 

To obtain a knowledge cf etiquette has been 
the study of clever men at various courts of 
Europe, sometimes for a lifetime. It grew to be 
so absurd and overloaded at certain courts in the 
last century that nature was stifled behind it. and 
occasionally a lively little queen or an impulsive 
king overthrew it with something not very unlike 
a kick. Indeed, Shakespeare makes King Henry, 
as he woos the fair Katherine of France, say 
with delightful elegance, "Nice customs courtesy 
to great kings;" but still, so important was this 
state and etiquette in the minds of the 'common 
people, that, no doubt, Marie Antoinette drew 
down the wrath of the French people by her im- 
patience at its stringency, and her childish lore 
of fun, her " descampativos " in the gardens of 
Versailles, were misinterpreted by the lookers-on, 
and those who were accustomed to " that Divinity 
which doth hedge a king " were thus disillusioned 
and injured by her lawlessness. 

The human mind is very fond of authority ; it 
likes precedent. More than half the world wishes 



10 THE AMERICAN CODE OP MANNERS. 

to be told what to do, and the attitude of looking up 
Is said by scuix>tors to be the most graceful one 
which the human form can adopt. Now it is a 
mistake to suppose that a man loses his indepen- 
dence when his manners take on courtesy. Far 
from it. The rulers of the world have, in nearly 
ail instances, been men who were polite, deferen- 
tial, modest. Courtesy of manner is often but 
another form of self-respect. The polite man is 
very apt to be the firmest, the most inaccessi- 
ble of men. He does not tell his secrets, or wear 
his heart upon his sleeve. His elegance of de- 
meanor is like the ice of Mont Blanc ; it keeps 
climbers at a distance, unless they have a strong 
purpose to gain. Kough men, uncivil men, have 
sometimes an idea that they would lose their 
force and independence if they became polished. 
Far from it. They would thus put on an armor 
of proof. 

Certain enfranchised women think that they 
gain fame and power by abolishing good man- 
ners ; but this is a mistake so profound, so deep 
and so lasting that it will right itself without fur- 
ther comment. The power of a woman is in her 
refinement., gentleness and elegance ; it is she 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. l\ 

who makes etiquette, and it is she who preserves 
the order and the decency of society. Without 
women > men soon resume the savage state, and 
the comfort and the grace of the home are ex- 
changed for the misery of the mining camp. 

In America we have the foundation of good 
manners, in the great chivalry of the men. No 
men have so profound a respect for women ; and 
this is the beginning of the "best etiquette. Polite- 
ness, which Sidney Smith said was one of the 
Christian graces, should flow from the heart, and 
a tenderness and protection, extending from the 
weaker to the stronger, is the corner-stone of 
good manners. From the captain of a western 
steamboat to the roughest miner in California, 
from north, south, east and west, we hear but one 
voice. Women are to be protected, respected, 
supported and petted. There is no such paradise 
for women as the United States of North America. 

In Paris, the headquarters of elegance, the 
rottenness of an old civilization has undermined 
this loyalty to the ideal woman. In London there 
is a brutality and coarseness, perhaps partly un- 
derlying the English character, perhaps proceed- 
ing from overcrowded streets and tenements, 



12 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

which descend with heavy hand upon the poorer 
women, and which reach by atmospheric pres- 
sure the women of every grade, 

Now, having thus the splendid reality of all 
grace, ail courtesy, all chivalry in the character of 
our men, we have to look at the character of our 
women, who are the recipients of this loyal and 
royal bounty. 

A lady who had held a high position as wife 
of a foreign Minister at various courts of Europe 
once said that she never ceased to wonder at the 
talents of her own young countrywomen. w They 
have intuitions of elegance," w T as her comment. 
She thought that their native refinement, quick 
intelligence, an apprehension of the necessities of 
a new position, were almost miraculous. " A 
young German countess," said she, "with six- 
teen quarterings, wiU come from her secluded 
chateau to the court at Berlin, awkward, em- 
barrassed and gauc?ie. It takes a season to 
make her at her ease. A young American lady 
will come from a New England town, or a West- 
ern city, and she will be at her ease, and perfect 
mistress of etiquette in a month." 

Now this is another advantage which grows out 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 13 

of an American code. With its many disadvan- 
tages it lias this great advantage, the young 
American lady feels herself to be the equal of 
any crowned head in Europe. So long as this 
does not become bumptiousness it is an advan- 
tage. When it does become an excuse for rude- 
ness, or bad manners, it is a very great disad- 
vantage. 

There is no doubt that the American girl is 
somewhat of a spoiled child. She forgets to be 
polite, to be deferential, to thank a gentleman 
for giving her his seat in an omnibus or car. She 
has received so much politeness that she now 
takes it as her right. 

This is a great mistake. No woman can afford, 
be she ever so beautiful, or so flattered, or so well 
placed, to disregard the solvency of her position. 
She must pay her debts, bow politely, thank 
heartily, receive graciously all the well-meant and 
the chivalrous attentions of men. 

It is to be feared that American women, as a 
class, have disregarded etiquette in Europe too 
much ; but this must be the subject of a separate 
paper, as it is a most important one. 

Etiquette, then, is simply a knowledge of how 



14 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNEKS. 

to behave at dinner, ball, private party, Presi- 
dent's reception, on the drive, at the races, in 
the private circle, or at a public reception or wed- 
ding, so that we shall be most agreeable, most or- 
namental, most decent. That good old English 
word is disregarded too much. It is a beautiful 
word, rightly considered. As an instance of its 
early meaning, one of the old English poets speaks 
of "that cleanly and decent flower, the violet." 
It is both cleanly and decent to observe in our 
friend's house the respect we owe to him and to 
ourselves. 

It is not respectable to go to a President's re- 
ception in a fustian jacket or a soiled collar ; a 
man owes it to himself, as an American prince, 
to dress himself well when he calls on his Chief 
Magistrate. A gentleman of to-day is known by 
his cleanliness, his immaculate linen ; he must 
bear the evidences of his bath about with him. 
He may wear the shabbiest clothes in the morn- 
ing, and the thickest shoes ; but for dinner 
and evening he must be in a neat black 
dress suit, with either black or white tie — the lat- 
ter the most distinguished — and, certainly, that 
simple formula costs him very little time or 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 15 

trouble. It is curious that men are willing to 
commit the solecism of a white tie with a frock 
coat, or to wear a dress coat in the morning, a 
heavy morning coat in the evening when calling 
upon a lady ; any of these violations of etiquette 
are so unnecessary, and the observance of the 
proper course so simple, that one would suppose 
that the right way would be the easiest, but this 
is again a matter of detail, and must be written 
up hereafter. 

Etiquette in America is resolving itself into a 
system, and the best sign of the times is the grow- 
ing interest in the subject. Every American citi- 
zen is interested in the best way of doing every- 
thing, and a man of true character and 
self-respect is always willing to learn. The people 
who make the most mistakes are the conceited 
and the half -learned. " A little learning is a 
dangerous thing" in any branch; in none 
more so than in society. Some people go about a 
great deal without apprehending the proprieties ; 
they dress badly and out of season ; they are too 
showy at one place, too plain at another, as the 
Empress Eugenie was said to show to her fellow- 
monarchs, who observed her curiously, that ' she 



16 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

was not born to the purple ' ' by her too great cor 
(liality to some and her too great coolness to 
others. She effused in the wrong place ; 
so do those who know a little of social 
matters, but not much, always commit the 
most important and glaring errors. The 
Indian girl, who came from her tent in the wil- 
derness to the Queen's drawing-room, committed 
no errors, for she pretended to know nothing. 
She received with simple and impressive dignity 
the attentions bestowed upon her, and gave back 
a queenly smile to the low bows of the courtiers. 

But a woman who effuses too much, who is 
swimming in affectation, who dresses too con- 
spicuously, who is too cordial, or too haughty — it 
is she who commits unconscious solecisms. To 
her a severe code of etiquette would be an invalu- 
able guide. She should be told that, if she paints 
her cheeks, dyes her hair, laces-in her waist to 
breathlessness, wears too high-heeled shoes or 
too loud dresses, she will never be mistaken for a 
lady, either at home or abroad. She may be mis- 
taken for quite another person than the lady that 
she is. 

Innocent women* from very ignorance, are 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MADNESS- 11 

often placed in a false position- Sincerity ill 
dress is as valuable sometimes as sincerity if 
character. 

No lady need be ashamed to dress plainly, o* 
cheaply. She can, with the help of the modern 
guides to dress, "appear like a lady" on very 
little money. She can lay down three rules for 
herself : Never to pretend to anything, never to 
wear false jewelry, and, affirmatively y always to 
be neat. 

A young girl with a white muslin and a fresh 
flower is dressed for a queen's ball. A lady of 
maturer years in a well-fitting dark silk, real 
jewelry or none, real lace or none, and her own 
iiair— all the better if it is white— is also dressed 
foi a ball. 

Not that gorgeous dress is to be disdained— 
" As costly your habit as your purse can buy,*' 
always. But let it be well made, by an artist, 
suiting your own age and style. 

True womanhood includes all the delicate re- 
finements that overflow in the perfect glove, the 
well-fitting shoe, the pretty stocking, the neat 
frills, the becoming bonnet. The American 
woman, to do her only justice, is a neat creature 



18 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

by instinct, and if she occasionally gives too 
much thought to dress, she is still to be admired 
and commended for her daintiness. 

Etiquette settles many a disputed point, and 
brings comfort to many a mind, in the new 
positions in which we find ourselves placed 
toward foreigners. Many Americans are sud- 
denly afflicted with a crude prosperity which they 
do not know how to use gracefully. To them 
etiquette should be defined as a code of laws. It 
is a convenience. 

Edward Everett commanded so much respect 
by the elegance of his manners when Minister to 
England, that some Boston man, who had known 
him as a youth, asked him how he had mastered 
the science of European etiquette ; his answer 
was a significant one : 

" I have never considered any subject un- 
worthy of intense observation. I pride myself 
on the manner in which I can tie up a brown 
paper parcel." 

So, in the most cultivated court of Europe, 
the American Minister was the best-bred man. 
On the other hand, our great man, Andrew Jack- 
son, thought that he showed his Americanism 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. IS 

by receiving the French Minister, who came in 
full uniform to present his credentials, in a 
ragged dressing-gown and smoking a corn-cob 
pipe. He called up his French cook, Denis, to 
translate for him. The result of this proceeding 
was to send the French Minister home to write 
to his Government that he had been insulted. It 
required all the tact of Mr. Van Buren to explain 
away the conduct of the eccentric President. 

Our republicanism now has become far more 
genuine, inasmuch as it realizes that a proper 
degree of etiquette can be made to assist us in 
framing an American code of manners at once 
elegant, simple, proper and decent, which will ex- 
tend all over the country, which p^.all penetrate 
to the extremest limits of civilization, and which 
shall settle points of controversy in the great 
cities. 

Jt is not a slavish adherence to Old World cere- 
monial. It is rather like our Laurel and our Eho- 
dodendron, a new and nourishing growth, having 
its rcots in our own soil, and destined, let us 
hope, to ornament and improve that society 
which has so splendid a future before it. 



20 TIIE AMEKXCAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

CHAPTER I. 

THE YOUNG MAN WHO DESIRES TO ENTER SOCIETY. 

IN our introduction we considered the vastness 
of our subject, a subject which must apply 
to people of very varied fortune and position, 
and which requires that rules be laid down 
which, while they may seem preposterously 
elaborate and unnecessary to the denizens of 
cities, are still like the grammar of an unknown 
language to the untaught youth or maiden, whose 
life has been spent in seclusion or in rustic neigh- 
borhoods. The old story of King George IV. 
(quite the best one ever told of him), that— sym- 
pathizing with the embarrassment of a young 
maid-of -honor, newly arrived from the country, 
who poured her tea into her saucer and who was 
laughed at by the surrounding courtiers — he, to 
encourage her and to rebuke them, poured his 
tea into his saucer, thus making it* the fashion, 
bears upon our idea. No one wants to pour his 
tea into his saucer if it is not the custom of 
polite society, for here we have no King George 



THE AMERICAN CODE OW MANNERS. 21 

to keep us in countenance. We must be right 

ourselves. 

Now, a young man coming to New York fresh 
from life on the Plains, or in a Western or East- 
ern college, or from service in the army, or from 
any life which lias separated him from the society 
of ladies, would he, perhaps, ignorant of many 
important little points of etiquette which it be- 
hooves him to know 

He should, if he wishes to enter society, try to 
get a letter from some one who knows him well 
in his own sphere to some prominent social 
leader in New York. If this is done, and the 
lady invites him to her house and makes it agree- 
able to him, he has nothing further to do but to 
render himself agreeable to her and to her circle ; 
his social fortune is made. 

But this good fortune cannot be commanded 
always, or often. Young men often pass through 
a lonely youth in a great city, never finding that 
desired opportunity. But to many it comes 
through friendship on the cricket ground, at the 
clubs, in their business. If a friend says that 
" Brockett is a good fellow,'' Brockett will proba- 
• bly be sought out and invited. 



22 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNESS. 

It is hardly creditable for a young man to live 
in a great city without knowing the best ladies' 
society. He should seek to do so, and, per- 
haps, the simplest way would be for him to ask 
some friend to take him about, and to introduce 
him. Once introduced, Brockett should be par- 
ticular to not transcend the delicate outlines of 
social sufferance ; he must not immediately rush 
into an intimacy. 

A call should never be too long. One hour was 
all that Madame Kecamier granted to the most 
agreeable of men. She said that she could stand 
nobody longer than that. The rule is a good one 
for an evening visit, for it is much better to have 
your hostess wishing that you would stay longer, 
than to stay so long that she wishes you would go. 

For a first visit, a gentleman should always 
send in his card. After that he may dispense 
with that ceremony. 

A gentleman for an evening visit should always 
be in an evening dress — black broadcloth dress- 
coat, vest, and pantaloons, faultless linen, and 
white cravat ; a black cravat is permissible, but 
it is not full dress. He should carry a crush hat 
in his hand, as it gives him something to hold, to # 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 23 

play with, often a great help to a shy man. His 
feet should be in low shoes and silk stockings, if 
he wishes to be very nice, but this is not indis- 
pensable, except for dancing. It is, however, very 
becoming. For a dinner party a white cravat is 
de rigueur ; a man must wear it then, and at a ball 
or opera. No jewelry of any kind is now fashion- 
able but finger-rings for gentlemen. They even 
discard their watch-chains in evening dress. But 
the Prince of Wales has made finger-rings very 
fashionable for men. The rings should be of 
dead-gold, with one or two jewels sunken in, and 
occasionally a serpent ring with a diamond in 
the head. The hand should be especially cared 
for ; the nails beautifully cut and trimmed, like 
Lord Byron's, if possible; as Lady Blessington 
described them, "a rose-leaf with a half -moon 
in it." 

If the hand is thus evidently cared for, no 
matter how big, hc~ muscular, how masculine 
it is, the more so the better, for women like to 
see men look strong and heroic, as if they could 
drive, row, play ball, cricket, and "handle the 
gloves. ' * 

It is a curious and eccentric fashion, but now 



24 THE AMERICAN COSE OE M INKERS. 

men wear no gloves in society. This is also a 
fashion introduced by the Prince of Wales. It 
must be a great saying in point of money. 

A gentleman's dress should be so perfectly 
quiet that it will never excite attention. Thack- 
eray was very amusing about a too new hat, and 
declared that he took a watering-pot to his to re- 
move an objectionable gloss. The suspicion of 
being "dressed up" defeats an otherwise excel- 
lent toilette. 

We will suppose that Brockett becomes 
sufficiently acquainted to be asked to join a 
theatre party; he must be punctual at the 
rendezvous and take whatever partner his 
hostess apportions to him, but he must not 
offer to send a carriage : that must come 
from the giver of the party. In this, Eastern 
and Western etiquette are at. variance, as we 
are told that in certain Western cities a young 
gentleman is expected to call in a carriage for a 
young lady and to take her to a party. This is a 
doubtful etiquette anywhere ; in New York and 
Boston it is not permitted at all. 

If, however, Brockett wishes to give a theatre 
party he must furnish everything. lie must 



TEE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNEB3, 85 

ask some lady to chaperon his party ; he must 
arrange that the ladies' rendezvous at a friend's 
house, and then he must send a chartered omni- 
bus or carriages for the whole party, he having 
previously bought the tickets, Ke must then in- 
vite his party to sup with him at Delmonico's, or 
the " Brunswick," cr his own rooms, making the 
feast as handsome as his means will allow. 

This is a very favorite and proper manner for a 
young gentleman to return the civilities which 
have been offered to him. 

It is indispensable, however, that he should 
have the mother of at least one of the young 
ladies present. The custom of very young chape- 
rons is rather brought into disrepute lately. On 
no account should a gentleman ever force himself 
into any society, or go anywhere uninvited. It 
seems almost preposterous to even allude to so 
improbable an event, had the offense not been 
committed ; but a handsome, well-bred and well- 
dressed young man once ruined himself in New 
York by going to an Assembly ball uninvited. 

He may go, of course, if taken by a lady, for 
she thus assumes the responsibility, and it is an 
understood thing that a leader of societv can take 



2fc THE AM2BICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

a young gentleman with her either to a friend's 
house or to an Assembly. She is his sponsor ; but 
without such an indorsement the young man 
must never go uninvited. 

•Young men carry their crush hats into a ball- 
room, and dance with them in their hands. 

In the early morning a man should wear the 
heavy, loose-fitting English clothes now so fashion- 
able ; but for an afternoon promenade with a lady, 
or for an afternoon reception, a frock-coat tightly 
buttoned, gray pantaloons, and a black satin scarf 
with plain heavy gold pin, would be " very good 
form," to use a current phrase. 

Neatness, frequent use of the bath, much 
exercise in the open air, these are the admirable 
customs of young gentlemen in the present age. 
If every one, no matter how busy, how hard 
worked, could come home, take a warm bath 
and dress for dinner, it would be an admirable 
plan. Indeed, if all American men, as all Eng- 
lishmen do, would show this attention to their 
wives, society would be far more elegant. A gen- 
tleman always expects his wife to dress for him ; 
why should he not dress for her ? And then he 
is ready for any evening visits, operas, parties, 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 27 

theatres, to which he may wish to go. No gentle- 
man should sit down to a seven o'clock dinner 
unless freshly dressed. 

If a young gentleman can afford to keep a 
tilbury or a dog-cart and fine horses, so much the 
better for him. He is then fitted to offer to 
take a young lady to drive if her mamma con- 
sents. 

But a servant should always sit behind-^that is 
indispensable, and the livery, the whole arrange- 
ment, should be quietly elegant. Brockett, if he 
would succeed, must not be flashy ; and, as all 
true gentleness must come from within, let him 
read Thackeray's noble description : 

"What is it to be a gentleman? Is it to be 
honest, to be gentle, to be generous, to be brave, 
to be wise, and possessing all these qualities to 
exercise them in the most graceful manner? 
Ought a>gentleman to be a loyal son, a true hus- 
band, and honest father ? Ought his life to be 
decent, his bills to be paid, his tastes to be high 
and elegant ? Yes — a thousand times, yes." 

Young men, on coming to New York, are often 
led astray by the sight of certain gaudy adven- 
turers, who unaccountably get into society and as 



28 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

unaccountably succeed. They see these men get 
on by means of enormous impudence, self-assur- 
ance, audacity and plausible ways. 

But if they will wait for a few years they will 
see them go down as rapidly as they rose. No 
adventurer lasts long ; he is a certain failure in 
the end. Give him rope enough and he will hang 
himself. 

A young gentleman should lose no opportunity 
of improving himself. There is a fine instruction 
in pictures and all works of art. He should 
read and study in his leisure hours, and fre- 
quent the refined museums and picture gal- 
lories. He will thus have a delightful topic of 
conversation for his evening call, or at the dinner 
table. Every one wishes to open his thought, his 
knowledge, his social skill in society. It is the 
place where we exchange our mental gifts, and a 
young man doing the work of the world is able to 
be one of the most agreeable of companions, if, 
even without the accepted polish of society, he 
brings a keen intelligence, refined tastes, and a 
cheerful desire to be agreeable, into the most 
elegant and rech&rche circle. 

It is not necessary here to refer to the etiquette 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 29 

of clubs. Clubs are self-protecting ; a man soon 
learns their rules and limitations. A man of 
honesty and character seldom gets into difficulty 
at his club. If his club rejects or pronounces 
against him, however, it is a social stigma from 
which he cannot recover. 

Success in society is like electricity — it makes 
itself felt, and yet is unseen and indescribable. 
We see very stupid men succeed, and very bright 
men fail ; but one thing can be certainly recom- 
mended—a young man should have some accom- 
plishment, such as leaving or singing, if he is 
gifted with a talent for music ; or a neat hand at 
drawing, or a pleasant trick of elocution, etc.; 
or he should read a poem well, or take part in a 
Shakespeare club, if he wishes to make himself 
popular ; a pretty talent for private theatricals is 
also useful, and to be a good dancer is now almost 
indispensable. However, if he is intelligent, 
and agreeable, he gets on without any of these 
helps. But they are undoubtedly an assistance. 
This is a working age that we live in, and the 
whole formation of society betrays it. Men dress 
plainly, simply, and without display. Their ser- 
vants dress better than they do, in one sense, and 



30 THE AMERICAN CODE OE MANNERS. 

yet nothing is so distinctive as the outline of 
a gentleman. It is as much a costume of no- 
bility, if properly worn — the plain black coat — 
as if it were the velvet cloak which Sir Walter 
Raleigh threw down before the Queen. 

A young gentleman should net carry into any 
lady's drawing-room the smell of tobacco. It is 
disagreeable to some women, they cannot bear 
it. A proper regard for these little things has 
made many a man's future. 

In addressing a note to a lady whom he 
does not know well, Brockett should use the 
third person, as follows : 

"Mr. Brockett presents his compliments to 
Mrs. Lea, and begs to know if she and Miss 
Lea will honor him with their company at a 
theatre party, on the evening of March 3d, at 
< Wallaces. ' 

" E. S. V. P. 17 East Arlington street. 
February 26th." 

This note should be sealed with sealing-wax, 
impressed with the writer's coat-of-arms, or a 
motto, and delivered by private messenger, 
who should wait for the answer if the lady is 
at home. 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 



31 



In addressing a letter to a gentleman the 
full title should be used, as— 

" George Tilden, Esq." 
Or, if the first name is not known, 

« Tilden, Esq." 

Never address a note to " Mr. George Tilden ;" 
if it be an invitation, it is not etiquette. 

In writing in the first person, Mr. Brocket!) 
must be careful not to be too familiar ; he must 
make no elisions nor contractions, but fill out 
every word and line as if the duty were a pleas- 
ant one. 

In fact respect, and a thorough determination 
to learn all the outward forms of a proper eti- 
quette, will soon put a man au courant with the 
rules of society. 



o£ THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNEES. 

CHAPTER II. 

A YOUNG LADY'S ENTRANCE INTO SOCIETY. 

TO the daughter of rich and influential par- 
ents, whose life has been " all velvet and 
roses " from her cradle, this important event is 
Ifcralded by the order of dresses from Paris, a 
ball at Delmonico's or at home, and the most 
extensive leaving of cards on all desirable ac- 
quaintances. The young lady stands beside 
her mother at her first ball, is presented, or 
launched, and takes her place in society with 
the way clear before her. 

To so fortunate a young lady as this no advice 
is necessary, except a very good old-fashioned 
reminder, that she " should obey her mother, 
and be a good girl." If she does that, if she 
avoids clandestine meetings with young gentle- 
men, and all foolish love affairs, and takes care 
of her health, she may be quite sure that her 
bark will float gaily on to the comfortable port 
of a happy marriage and a successful future. 
£ But our great country is full of beautiful 



THE AMERICAN CODE OE MANNERS. 33 

young girls who have no such start in lite, 
They may have excellent and well-to-do par- 
ents who are " not in society," or they may bo 
without parents to help them on. It has hap- 
paned to many an American lady, who has sat, 
later, in the highest places, a President's or 
Senator's wife, that these questions of society 
and etiquette have had to be conquered and an- 
swered and comprehended by herself alone. 

The first advice to a beginner is this : " Re- 
spect your parents ; love them first and 
always ; regard your mother as your best friend, 
even if, in her unselfish regard for her family, 
she has forgotten to be elegant. Remember that 
with her near you you are always safe, and that 
her advice is dictated by a love which has a Di- 
vine origin." Nothing is so often quoted against 
American girls as that they are not respectful to 
their mothers. Without that filial grace no 
young woman can become a lady. No ; a disre- 
spectful daughter is the most vulgar of people. 
But should a young girl be motherless, she must 
select a chaperon if she would go into society. 
Nothing is so imperative as this, and yet many 
well-meaning girls forget or ignore it, and en- 



84 fHE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

deavor to make a career without that necessary 
adjunct. It leads to yery embarrassing mistakes 
sometimes. So long, however, as a girl has the 
protecting influence and shield of uoork, independ- 
ence is all very well— 

"A thousand liveried ang3ls lackey her.'* 

But as soon as she begins to go into society she must 
have the protection of an oldef woman. 

If she is a young schoolmistress, artist or musi- 
cian learning a profession or working for the sup- 
port of herself or her parents, the world deems 
her self-consecrate — she is as safe as Joan 
of Arc from the world's slanderous tongues. 
Put if she go into the world of fashion, she 
must accept its laws and limitations ; they are 
like iron, and they must be observed if she would 
succeed as a woman of the world. 

A young Southern lady, several years ago, pes- 
sessed of a large fortune, deliberately hired a 
father and a mother, and went to Paris to live. She 
was an orphan, but she found without difficulty a 
gentleman and his wife who were most willing to 
live with her, to go out in her carriages, to accom- 
pany her to the theatres, balls and parties, go it 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS, 35 

the summer to Baden-Baden and Homburg, and 
Trouville, yet who were only her chaperons. She 
went through several seasons of delightful life 
abroad, respected and admired. Not choosing to 
marry and fee a foreigner, she afterward? married 
one of her own countrymen, and still lives abroad. 
It was a good idea. All young heiresses are not 
so sensible. Eemembering the freedom which 
American women enjoy at heme, they go to 
Europe thinking that they can enter society there 
with the same freedom and impunity with which 
they enter it here. It is not so. A respectable 
young lady must have, if not a guardian^ cer- 
tainly a chaperon. 

As for common etiquette, women imbibe that 
with the air. They soon learn what card to use 
'at should always have the prefix of " Miss") and 
how to dress ; that seems to come by instinct. 
But if any are ignorant on that point, let us 
quote an old French proverb : "Femme sotte se 
coignait a la cotte." " A foolish women is known 
by her finery," 

Too much loading on of trimmings is in bad 
taste for the young ; they do not need jewelry 
or the arts of the toilet. In England the 



86 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

mother wears all the jewelry, the daughter 
none. 

Above all things let her not paint her cheeks, 
Remember the complexion is a thing which must 
be approached from within. Health and exercise 
must send the bloom outward. Paint never de- 
ceives anybody ; it is certain to give the face a 
meretricious air. 

So of all hair-dye, of touching up the eyebrows 
and eyelashes. The young woman who does 
these thirgs soon becomes a marked character ; 
all men discern it at a glance. 

Also let her beware of strong perfumes. They 
are not in good taste, not even in one's note-paper. 
A box of oriental orris root powder on her dress 
ing'tatle, which has a healthy, clean fragrance 
like violets, and some German cologne, are all that 
a young lady needs (after cleanliness) to make 
her the sweetest thing on the face of this earth. 

Heavy musk, patchouli attar of roses, or any of 
the strong scents, are disagreeable to some peo- 
ple, therefore should be avoided. 

Cleanliness is the foundation of all elegance, all 
beauty, all refinement and all physical merit and 
health 



THE AMERICA!? CODE OF MANNERS. 3? 

The subject of cold or warm bathing must be 
carefully approached To those who can bear a 
cold bath, it is the most invigorating and delight- 
ful of all ways oi" beginning the day, A healthy 
girl who can take a cold bath and then a horse- 
back ride, and then eat a hearty breakfast, is 
almost sure to be beautiful and happy. 

But all cannot do these things with impunity. 
Many young ladies have lost their health by too 
mu?h physical exercise, and are too delicate for 
such robust treatment. A physician should be 
consulted, and the young lady should obey him 
strictly, for a woman absolutely needs her health, 
and it is a great misfortune if she, through 
imprudence, loses it early. Wet feet, draughts, 
and abrupt change from heavy to light dress, 
should be avoided. 

A girl's mother, if all that she ought to be, will 
take care cf everything ; but, as we have said, 
all girls have not prudent mothers — some, alas ! 
none at all. Therefore, as American girls are 
prone to take care of themselves, let them do it 
in the right way. They should not walk in the 
streets alone, nor conspicuously, often. All in- 
vitations to gentlemen should proceed from the 



38 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

mother ; indeed, the mother should be first and 
foremost in everything ; and happy is it for her 
daughter, if she is still young, agreeable, culti- 
vated, so that she is a pleasant factor at the sup- 
pers, and dinners and balls which are given for 
her daughter. Then all goes well. But if the 
mother be dead, or necessariiy absent, or ill, so 
that she cannot chaperon her daughter, a chap- 
eron must be obtained in some way. Society al- 
lows a young lady to go nowhere alcne, except 
on horseback, and then a groom must ride behind 
her. In England, the governess goes with the 
young ladies to walk, shopping, and sometimes 
into society; but her functions end before the 
grand ball, the ceremonious dinner. A lady of 
social tact must be selected for that office. 

In America there is little difficulty in find- 
ing a friend, some lady who will either occasion- 
ally or always play that part to a friendless 
girl. 

The chaperon need not make herself up into a 
Spanish duenna. She need not suspect an am- 
bush, or a lover in every flirting of a fan ; yet she 
shoiild be watchful. She, is the Providence of the 
young lady. She knows the world, but the young 



THE AME3ICAN CODE 0? MARKERS. 8£ 

lady does not know it, She is the person to 
prevent mistakes. She should see that her 
charge does not make improper acquaintances. 
She must watch the men who approach the young 
lady, and keep off adventurers, too thickly swarm- 
ing in all American society. She should discour- 
age intimacies with those other young ladies, 
who, having been out several seasons, have not 
left very clear and superior records behind them. 
To the girl ju§t entering society it is a bewilder- 
ing place, and the tinsel is as good as the gold. 
The wise society matron knows it all, and knows 
that the awakening from a dream of delight to a 
cold and frightful reality is a thing which may 
happen to any girl. Judiciously, truly, wisely, a 
chaperon should shape a young girl's destiny hy 
warding off evil and encouraging all that is good, 
sincere and noble in the character and actions. 
When parents who have not been in society wish 
to introduce a daughter, they can, with perfect 
propriety, give a ball or other entertainment, and 
invite many people whom they have net previously 
visited. If those people do not choose to come, 
no self-respect is lost. It is merely a form of 
saying, on the part of some of them, that they 



40 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

ba\' e acquaintances enough already ; nc one need 
feel hurt. Enough people will come, in nine 
cases out of ten, if there is no moral objection to 
the inviting party, 

A young lady, therefore, on entering society 
has to consic. several things. She must watch 
her own manners ; if they are too gay, joyous and 
striking, she may be misunderstood ; if they are 
cold, haughty, repellent, she will have very little 
success. Let her try for that juste milieu which 
is so charming in everything. She should be 
courteous ; let her cultivate a graceful bow and 
smile, which looks always kindly, and is a little 
nattering. There is no insincerity in that. Lord 
Houghton praised the bow and smile of one 
American lady as being the best he had ever 
seen; "It puts a crown on one," he said. A 
bow and smile should look as if they came from 
the heart, where all good things come from. 

She should consider her voice— very apt, in 
America, to be loud, nasal, unpleasant. The 
English women have great advantage of us here. 
They speak lower, with a much better pronuncia- 
tion than we do. Either our climate has affected 
tlje throat unfavorably, or we have had bad 



TEE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 41 

models for years. Certainly English people speak 
our mother tongue better than we do. 

Young ladies should not speak or laugh loud at 
the theatre. Often a box-full of fashionable peo- 
ple has rendered the neighborhood unpleasant 
to those who would listen to an opera or a play. 
This is very bad breeding, and renders the perpe- 
trators obnoxious. 

As for the great questions of love and mar- 
riage, these young ladies must settle for them- 
selves. Let them avoid secret engagements and 
clandestine interviews, and, above all, be careful 
how they write letters. They must remember 
that what is written remains, and that half of the 
trouble which women have met with in this life 
has come from the writing of letters. 

On the part of the chaperon, however, 
there should be, respecting letters, a deli- 
cacy and caution. While she should give 
her charge the best advice, she has no 
right to break a seal. The sacredness of 
a seal is inviolate among well-bred people. In 
this respect young people are always honestly 
and justly tenacious of their rights. A mother, 
even, has no right to open a letter addressed to 



42 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

her (laughter ; a husband who opens his wife's 
letters, or a wife who trifles with those ad- 
dressed to her husband, cannot be too 
severely condemned, These are innocent con- 
fidences reposed in the one which are not in- 
tended for the other, and the seal is a 
lock which should not be picked. If a daughter 
has not principle enough to confide in her mother, 
no amount of espionage will make her confidential. 

And here, as in ail relations of life, honesty and 
confidence beget honesty and confidence. Young 
men and young women who are treated as upon 
honor rarely deceive their parents or guardians. 
If a young man finds himself suspected and 
watched by his teacher he feels immediately in- 
spired to baffle him. If his teacher says, " Young 
gentleman, I put you upon your honor> and I 
know that yon will not deceive me," he is rarely 
deceived. 

If a young girl finds herself dogged, watched 
and suspected — if she detects her chaperon trying 
to open her notes or furtively watching her — she 
is very apt to think that double-dealing is the 
proper thing, and to try to outwit the detective- 
It is a mean, low, poor plan on both sides. 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 43 

In introducing a daughter, parents seldom or 
never put her name on the card. The highest 
social authorities in New York merely send the 
usual form of evening invitation : 

Mrs. Walsingham 

at home, 

Thursday evening, February 9th, 

at ten o'clock. 

Cotillon. 

On arriving at the ball the guests find the 
young lady standing at her mother's right 
hand ; she is introduced, and dances the 
German with the gentleman whom her mother 
has selected to lead the German. That is all. 

Several motherless young ladies, who have 
had to introduce themselves, in New York, 
have done it by means of a ladies' lunch. 
This is a very pretty and proper way of be- 
ginning society life. 

In the etiquette of the ball-room young 
ladies should be very careful to keep their 
promises to their various partners. Little 
books are furnished as memorizers, and the 
same honor is imperative here as in greater 
things. Nothing is so insulting to a young 
man as for a young lady to forget or ignore 
these engagements. 



44 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

A young lady should never accept presents of 
jewelry from any man, excepting the one to 
whom she has promised her hand. And great 
delicacy should be shown in allowing young men 
to pay for tickets, to be mulcted for bouquets, 
I>hilopcna presents, the hire of a carriage, etc. 
If a lady is caught in the rain and a gentleman 
hires a carriage for her and he pays for it, she 
should inclose him the price of the carriage im- 
mediately. There are three dreadful words used 
about certain classes of young ladies in society ; 
they are these: " sponge," "fast," "loud." 
Let every young lady who hopes to succeed 
avoid them all. 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 45 



CIIAPTER in, 

A YOUNG COUPLE ON THEIR ENTRANCE INTO 
SOCIETY. 

IT 53 hard to imagine a young conpie who have 
to begin life without acquaintances ; but the 
fact exists. For those who have wealth, and 
family, and position, therefore, the rules which we 
are about to consider have no application, The 
questions of which they treat bave been long an- 
swered for them. The " well -established " need 
not read these papers. 

But many a young man marries a lady from 
anothei city, and brings her to New Yoik (which 
we will suppose to be the social centre of 
American life) with no particular knowledge of 
that best society which is the only circle into which 
he wishes to see his wife introduced. The young 
couple are all at sea— they are wanderers in a 
trackless forest. 

The question comes up : How shall tbey begin ? 
Who is to find them? Whc is to drive the en- 
tering wedge into this dense block which we call 



46 T33 AMSBIOAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

Society ? The answer generally :s this : Acci- 
dent, "the subruler of the universe," will lead 
them to know somebody. Ths rector or clergyman 
of their favorite church, the business partners of 
the gentleman, or some old friend of the lady. 
Somebody wiii turn up. It is very true that nice 
young people do not long remain unknown, al- 
though these early days are a lonely period for 
the young married woman, who has left, we will 
say, a very brilliant belledom in some distant 
city to come to find social extinction in her new 
home ; it is undoubtedly very hard. 

It is a crucial test of character if a young and 
pretty woman goes through these two or three 
years of loneliness with amiability and without 
committing any mistakes. She is exposed to 
three dangers. 

The first and greatest is this ; If she be pretty, 
a jaded man of fashion is apt to find her out, and 
to promise to introduce her into fashionable 
circles if she will consent to a flirtation with 
him. This succeeds wonderfully at first, as all 
empirical remedies are said to eta, but it is apt to 
be fatal in the end. 

The second danger is that she, in her desire to 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 47 

achieve the rank which she knows is hers, shows 
too great a desire to "be invited and to make ac- 
quaintances, and she is then accused of "push," 
which is a fata! word. 

The third danger is, that she accepts, in lieu of 
the best acquaintances, second and third-rate 
people, the hangers-on upon society, people who 
have not the best or freshest reputation— the Mrs. 
Leo Hunter^, the Misses Bore and the Messrs. 
Fraudulent, who are a large family. Society is 
often deceived ; it sometimes indorses a villain ; 
it often accepts a fraud ; and yet its general voice 
is apt to be judicious and correct. People are 
respected or not, as their characters deserve. 

This is a general rule, which the exceptions 
prove ; the best people, in every sense, continue 
through time to be at the head of society. 

As for the Mrs. Leo Hunters, the Misses Bore 
and the Messrs. Fraudulent, they continue to hang 
on to society by means of influential family ; of 
certain, perhaps, agreeable traits of their own ; 
or by that carelessness which leaves open the 
doors of certain well-known fashionable houses. 
The second-rate set is a set easy to get into, 
hard to get out of, for no people stick so close 



48 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

as those who are wholly undesirable. A young 
woman should be very careful to form no inti- 
macies with those whom she finds very easy and 
very pertinacious early acquaintances in her new 
life. 

If she is reticent, if she is particular, if she 
waits, some day a quiet lady in a plain bonnet 
and dress will come in and give her name, and 
say that she has heard of her young neighbor 
and friend, and desires to know her, and lo ! she 
will find that the very first lady in the city has 
called upon her, and that her social career will be 
from that time only an upward and an onward 
success. 

If she is wise, if she only knows how to manage 
it, if she has tact ! And if she has not tact, she 
may as well give up any hope of success. 

It is, of course, etiquette for a young married 
pair to send their cards to all whom they wish to 
know, and the bride does well to fix a day on 
which to receive her friends. 

This should extend through one or two months, 
especially in a large city, as the world is busy, 
and cannot always achieve an early visit. 

If the means of the young couple will allow, 



THIS AMEllIGAN CODE OF MANNERS. 43 

they should begin a series of little dinners, not 
necessarily expensive ones ? as a means of making 
themselves popular and well known, for every- 
body likes to be asked to dinner. 

Lives there a man with soul so dead 

That to himself he has not said 

I like my neighbor's wine and bread," 

was # Sidney Smith's paraphrase of a well-known 
poem. Dirners make you soon acquainted ; din- 
ners are social. Everybody must dine, therefore 
give one day of the week to a little dinner— if yoa 
can. 

And if the young couple have but a neat maid- 
servant, who wears a cap and knows her busi- 
ness ; if the lady can carve a chicken— and all 
ladies should know how to do that ; if the gen- 
tleman has a good bottle of wine or two, and 
genuine cigars ; if their house is neatly, quietly 
furnished, with the last magazines on the table ; 
if the welcome is cordial, and there is no fussy 
pretense, no effort to appear to live beyond their 
means, no noise, no fatal errors of character, 
these little dinners will become very famous, 
and will be preferred to the showy and the 
grand dinners of the very rich, which are often 



50 TEE AMERICAN CODE OV MANNERS. 

exceedingly dull, and but a payment of other 
social debts. 

But to achieve a perfect little dinner with small 
means is a very great intellectual feat. It re- 
quires service by no means common in America ; 
it requires a great talent on the part of the young 
hostess. If she tries and fails, let her give it up 
and take an evening. 

Evening receptions once were very fashion- 
able in New York, and were most agreeable 
forms of entertaining. They have become less 
common, much to the disadvantage of society. 
It would be well to reinstate them. A young mar- 
ried woman who, in her fresh pretty house, will 
have a musical evening or a conversation even- 
ing, with but a cup of tea and a maccaroon for 
refreshment, would: soon find herself a power in 
society if she has that infinite tact of a hostess 
to make it agreeable. 

But people are frightened off: from simple enter- 
tainments by the splendor of the great luxurious 
suppers and dinners given by the very rich, and 
it is a foolish rear. 

If a young married woman has any specialty, 
such as music, she soon gathers about her 



THE AMERICAN CODS OF MANNERS. 51 

a congenial circle ; if she has a taste for chari- 
ties, she can in that way do a great deal 
of good, and, at the same time, make more 
acquaintances. 

But this has been fearfully abused. One charity 
in New York is now called the " Stepping- 
Stone," so many young women of ambitious 
social propensities have joined it, simply that 
they might know the very eminent ladies who 
compose its board of directors. When a woman 
prostitutes her religion or her charity to the for- 
warding of her fashionable position, she soon gets 
found out, and not unfrequently dropped. If she 
Is a sincere, good worker, she is appreciated 
and recognized. But pretenders are neither. 
A young married couple owe it to themselves to 
be fastidious about the character of ail their ac- 
quaintances. 

1 A high moral character, a thorough educa- 
tion, command of temper, delicacy of feeling, 
and a good bearing should be the indispensable 
requisites for good society. Without these 
there can hardly be good breeding or good man- 
ners. Of course wit and accomplishments are 
social advantages. Birth is often lost sight of, 



D'J, THE AMERICAN CODE OE MANNERS. 

though it has been seen in well-bred circles 
abroad that men who inherit the advantages of 
generations of transmitted culture are found 
more affable and genial than the sons of the 
new aristocracy. Some people seem to imag- 
ine that a certain rudeness or insolence 
gives them importance, but they should know 
that all disregard of the rights of others pro- 
claims vulgarity. 

No rank or wealth or fame should induce a 
pure-minded woman to admit to her circle a 
man or woman of bad reputation. Society is 
a sort of court that must judge and pronounce 
in a severe and remorseless way on those sins 
which are not tried in the courts of law. The 
persons ostracized may be the victims of gos- 
sip and scandal, but society must err on the 
safe side. It is a sort of moral police, and its 
verdict serves as a restraint on sin. At the • 
same time we would warn against a readiness 
to believe the stories of a club-room, and that 
taste for gossip that should be discounte- 
nanced by all good society. The cure for gos- 
sip is culture. Those who are not able to 
taak of things are driven to the necessity of 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. bJ 

talking about people. Young people should 
avoid, by the most thorough culture, all tempta- 
tion to indulge in gossip. It is a good rule to 
make it a point never to repeat what was not 
meant for repetition. The tattler is a disturb- 
ing element of society. A society where gossip 
predominates is bad society. Where vulgar- 
ity predominates the society is bad. Finally, 
as some one says, " Call no society good till 
you sound its morals as well as its man- 
ners." 

Let no young couple be ashamed of poverty. 
It is a thistle which, when grasped, ceases to sting. 
Nor let them be ashamed, for a few years, to 
accept civilities from those who joyfully extend 
them. The time for returning these will come. 

In inviting guests to dinner, the hostess should 
be in the parlor, waiting ior her guests at least 
five minutes before they arrive. She should have 
anticipated every possible emergency, and have 
seen, herself, that the dinner table is properly laid 
and the wine coded, the dining-room not over- 
heated—that is a very common objection, and 
ruins many a dinner. She should be cool, calm, 
collected, smiling herself, and know exactly where 



54 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

every one is to sit. The most distinguished gen- 
tleman must sit at her own right hand, of course. 
In inviting evening guests, both husband and 
wife must remember that to sink one's self 
in one's guests is the first phase of good 
breeding. In any rank in life, to invite people to 
show them your splendor, to exalt yourself, is the 
perfection of vulgarity. 

A young couple devoted to each other some- 
times make the mistake of showing their affection 
too plainly in company. That was severely dealt 
with by Charles Lamb in an immortal essay sev- 
eral decades ago. It is a great offense against 
good manners, as it puts every ore else at a dis- 
advantage. People of tact and taste never make 
this mistake. Husband and wife at their own en- 
tertainments should not take much notice of 
each other ; both should be devoted to their 
guests. 

The duty of writing notes will fall on the wife. 
She should learn from all the best authorities the 
most perfect forms. Her invitations should, for 
dinner, be in the third person, and her familiar 
notes should be signed with her own name. There 
is an unaccountable American vulgarity abroad, 



THE AMERICAN COl^E OF MANNERS. 5o 

by believing in which married women sign their 
names " Mrs." As, for instance, instead of 

" Yours truly, 

Mary L. Brown," 

the lady signs herself 

" Yours truly, 

Mrs. James Brown." 

This last form is wrong. Her husband might as 
well sign his checks " Squire James Brown," or 
" Captain Tompkins." 

A married woman should either say 

"Mrs. Brown desires the pleasure of your com- 
pany," 

or she should write in the first person and keep to 
it, signing her baptismal name. 

The husband's duty, in America, is to make the 
money, the wife has her duty in spending it. He 
works ; she is supposed to play. He makes the 
fire, she tends it. Women carry on society ; yet 
the man has his part, as at his clubs and his 
dances and his suppers. But the Great Disposer 
of events sometimes determines that the woman 
shall be the bread-winner ; that she shall hold up 



56 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNER!, 

her husband when he fails ; and, to the credit 
of American women be it said, they have not 
been slow to do this. In the last five dreadful 
years of commercial distress the women have 
shown enormous capacity for work. The story of 
the Decorative Art Society, the history of litera- 
ture, the various branches of science and art 
for which women's work fits her, have a noble 
story to tell of the devotion of women to a self- 
imposed task. 

And to the credit of society, be it spoken, this 
power of work does not hurt a woman's position 
in society. The butterflies respect the bees — an- 
other tribute to the power of character. 

All the good management, however, of a 
model hostess cannot prevent accident. The cook 
will get drunk at a most important dinner ; 
the waiter may fall down and break the Sevres 
porcelain ; husband may be kept down towji 
late, and be dressing in the very room where 
the ladies are to take off their cloaks. In this 
respect the American houses, except the so- 
called English basement, are frightfully incon- 
venient. 

To all these desagrements a hostess must pre- 






THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 5? 

sent a front of invincible self-possession and. re- 
pose. She must be 

" Mistress of herself, though china fail." 

And she should never talk of her health or her 
servants. Let her remember that these topics 
amuse no one but herself. 

Invitations to dinner should be answered at 
once, and all invitations should be answered 
speedily if an answer is desired. Certain large 
entertainments do not require that the invited 
guests record themselves ; but to most invitations 
the "R. S. V. P." appended at the foot shows 
that the hostess wishes to know whom she may 
es pect. 

A young couple should be particulary respectful 
to the older people in society ; should return a 
visit within a week or inclose a card, and should 
leave no form of respect unpaid. Too many 
young married couples, absorbed in their new 
happiness, ignore these attentions; but if they do, 
they suffer for it the remainder of their lives, 



58 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 



CHAPTER IV. 

DINNERS, LARGE AND SMALL — THEIR ETIQUETTE, 
NUMBER OF COURSES AND LIMITATIONS. 

u A MAN should, if he die after having ac- 

jTjL. cepted an invitation to dinner, leave 
his executors in solemn charge to fill his place," 
said Sidney Smith, in that vein of burlesque 
solemnity with which his ample wit draped 
all trifles. And the absurdity contains a truth. 
Dinners are so carefully measured ; they 
are so important to the host and hostess ; 
they are the results of so much care and 
thought, that every one is socially bound to 
remember the engagement and keep it with 
punctuality. 

If illness or necessary absence from town 
cause the invitee to regret, after having ac- 
cepted, a note in the first person should 
inform the hostess at the earliest possible mo- 
ment, that she may invite somebody to fill the 

ice. 

invitations to dinner in New York, in the gay 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 59 

season, are sent out a fortnight in advance. The 
form Js this : 

"Mrs. Stevenson 
requests the pleasure of Mr. and Mrs. Brown's 
company at dinner, on February 22d, at seven 
o'clock. 

"R. S. V. P. 17 East Kent street.'' 

The answer should be — 

l - Mr. and Mrs. Brown have much pleasure in 

accepting the polite invitation of 

Mrs. Stevenson 

for dinner on February 22d. 

22 Remington street. 
February 7th." 

Or ? if they decline — 

" Mr. and Mrs. Brown regret that a previous 
engagement will prevent their acceptance of 

Mrs. Stevenson's 
very polite invitation for dinner on February 
22d. 

22 Remington street," 

Always allow a l'ne for the name of your 
hostess. 
The invitation does not enter into particulars, 



60 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

unless you are asked to meet some distinguished 
person. Then the card reads— *. 

" Mrs. Stevenson 
requests the pleasure of Mr. and Mrs. Brown's 
company on Tuesday, February 22d, at seven 
o'clock, 

To meet the Swedish Minister." 

In answering, the simple form mentioned above 
is all that is necessary. 

Much talk has taken place lately about the use 
of the letters " R. S. V. P.," some thinking it 
unnecessary. The fact remains that the best 
people use them. It simply means " an answer 
is requested" (under the elegant veil of " Re- 
pondezsHl vous plait," which sounds more polite). 
It is not put on all cards, as, for instance, to a 
tea or a reception, because then the hostess does 
not care to know exactly who are coming. 

But a dinner invitation should be answered 
quickly and positively. Never hint at any con- 
tingency, but give your hostess the simple assur- 
ance that you will come, or that you will not 
come. Never say that you '-'would come if so 
and so." Now for the dinner. Never attempt to 
give a dinner unless you are sure of your cook 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 61 

and your waiter— that both are very good (unless 
you give your dinner d la Busse, and order 
everything from a restaurant. These are not the 
best dinners. The dishes are apt to be cold, 
greasy and poor unless you have the very best 
restaurant in the world at hand). 

The best dinners are those given by excellent 
housekeepers, whose domestic service is perfect, 
who have a good cook who is famous for in- 
dividual dishes, and with a waiter who is at home, 
and who can call in, if he needs them, some men 
to help him. 

The American habit of hiring the same 
waiters who have just served at a neighbor's 
house led to a very curious mistake by a 
foreign nobleman. Looking at a well-known old 
black man, who used to serve at all the dinners, 
he remarked: "What a very singular resem- 
blance the colored race bear to each other. Now 
i could swear I had seen your butler at every 
dinner I have eaten in New York." This habit 
of hiring a "set of retainers" had never oc- 
curred to the nobleman. 

The " little dinners," therefore, for eight or ten, 
cooked in the house, served by the servants of 



63 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 



the family, simple and short dinners, are the 
most agreeable, the most nattering as atten- 
tions, and require, if given often, a far greater 
care and expenditure of thought than the one 
splendid show dinner. 

Now the hostess who aspires to the reputation 
of a "good dinner giver" must remember four 
things : Her room must not be too warm, nor 
her light too glaring ; she must have a first-rate 
cook, and she must select congenial people. These 
laws may be extended into a thousand ramifica- 
tions; but they are four cardinal principles. 
A room so warm that it causes the flowers 
to wither will be necessarily withering to the 
brains of the diners. Eating makes people warm ; 
therefore your dining-room should be cool. It is 
the common American mistake to overheat - 
rooms. The gaslight helps this heat, and, there- 
fore, many hostesses are using candles and lamps. 
The latter, though very fashionable, are hor- 
ribly inconvenient, and often go out on the din- 
ner table, causing a smell and a smudge which 
ruins every one's appetite. Candles are very 
pleasing, but they drip and make trouble. Let 
us hope that the electric light is coming, and that 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 63 

it will supersede gas, candles and lamps. Shades 
are now so generally introduced that there is 
little trouble about a glare of light. 

"To be composed" is a difficult thing for a 
young hostess. She is essentially nervous and 
anxious, particularly if she is just beginning to 
entertain. But here she must resolutely put on a 
mask of composure and " assume a virtue if she 
has it not. ' ' Nothing is of so much importance as 
her own demeanor ; if that is dignified and quiet, 
she triumphs. A fussy hostess who scolds the 
servants, wrinkles her brow, or even forgets to 
listen to the man who is talking to her, is the 
ruin of a dinner. The author of "Cecil "tells 
his niece to see " stewed puppy-dog served with- 
out noticing it." Few hostesses have so severe 
an ordeal as that would be demanded of them, 
but the maxim is a good one. 

The company should be congenial. This is a 
hard rule to follow, and requires tact and intelli- 
gence. Remember the golden rule, and " do unto 
others as you would that they should do unto 
you," so do not invite a party thoughtlessly, 
simply to pay your debts; try to remem- 
ber if there has been a family quarrel 



64 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

or any reason why your friends would not like to 
meet each other. Remember that it is best to 
mix the different ages and styles of person. Do 
not get into ruts, or invite only the young or only 
the elderly. The gracious Lord has put us in fam- 
ilies—fathers, mothers, children ; and the most 
agreeable parties are those where the same rule 
of nature is observed. 

All extremes of luxury and every element of 
profusion are now fashionable, but there is one. 
simple dinner which covers the whole ground and 
to which the poor gentleman may aspire, and to 
which he might invite a prince. The essentials 
of a perfect dinner are but few. The beauty of 
a Grecian vase without ornaments is perfect. 
You may add cameo and intaglio, vine, acanthus 
leaf, satyrs and fawns, handles of ram's horns 
and circlet of gems to your vase if you wish and 
are rich enough ; but unless the outline is perfect, 
the splendor and the arabesque but make the vase 
vulgar. So with the simple dinner ; it is the un- 
adorned Grecian vase. With the splendid dinner, 
if these first rules are observed, the added luxury 
does not hurt it ; it is the Grecian vase heavily 
ornamented. 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 65 

A perfectly clean, fine damask table-cloth, 
napkins of equally delicate fabric, spotless glass - 
and silver, and pretty china— everything as neat 
as wax ; the middle of the table furnished with 
growing plants in a low basket or high vase 
with cut flowers, as the hostess pleases — these 
are the beginning. Put a dinner roll in the nap- 
kin (which is simply folded) at each plate ; have 
chairs that are high enough ; low chairs at a din- 
ner are distressing, bringing the arms below the 
proper angle for the knife and fork. Each place 
should have four or live glasses for the different 
wines and a goblet for water. If these glasses 
are of different colors it adds to the beauty of 
the table. The dessert of candied fruits may be 
in pretty glass or silver dishes. This is a simple 
dinner, but good enough for a gourmet; put 
none of it on the table — let it be served from the 
side table: 

Oysters on the half-shell. 
Sherry. Soupe a la Eeine. Sherry. 

i Shad or Salmon, with > 
White wine, j Cucumbers or Green Pcas , \ Hock. 

Burgundy t Filet do Ba-af aux 

and -| Champignons. 
Champagne. I Fried Potatoes. 



6t) THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 



Madeira. 



Koman Punch. 
Salad of Lettuce or Tomatoes 
and Cold Chicken. 



Sherry, j Ices and Jellies. Cheese. 

Poit. 1 Fruit. 

Coffee. 
Liqueur. 



That is not an expensive dinner or a splendid 
dinner, but it is essentially a good dinner. 
The serving of the wine is sometimes altered by 
the taste of the gentleman of the house. Thus, 
many gentlemen like old Madeira before the 
sweets, although others serve it after the dessert. 
The champagne should be served after the fish 
and with the piece cle resistance, as the heaviest 
dish is called. 

Such a dinner as this can be given once a week 
by people of moderate fortune to a party of eight or 
ten without extravagance, and it is as safe to say, 
with good company it is the most enjoyable kind. 

From this up to the millionaire dinners, served 
on gold and silver and priceless Sevres, Dresden, 
Japanese and Chinese plates, with flagons of ruby 
glass bound with gold, with Benvenuto Cellini 
vases and silver candelabra, the ascent is gradual. 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 67 

The table-cloth is often of openwork lace over a 
color, with red velvet mat under the splendid silver 
epergne, which is lined with mirror. The mats are 
mirrors ; the crystal drops of the epergne flash like 
diamonds. Each lady has a bouquet, a fan, a rib- 
bon painted with her name, a basket or bonbon* 
mere to take home with her. The courses are 
often sixteen in number, the wines are of fabu- 
lous value, antiquity and age — each drop is like 
the Kiver Pactolus, whose sands were of gold. 
The viands are brought from Algiers to St. 
Petersburg. Strawberries and peaches in Janu- 
ary, the roses of June in February, pears from 
San Francisco, artichokes from Marseilles, 
oranges and strawberries from Florida, game 
from Arizona and Chesapeake Bay, and mutton 
and pheasants from Scotland, green peas from 
France and caviare from Russia often meet on 
the same dinner table. For a splendid dinner 
take this : 

Oysters on the half -shell. 

Soups. 

Chicken consomme a l'ltalienne. 

Sherry. Puree of Green Peas. Sherry 

Fish. 

Salmon, 



68 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 



Hock. 



Champagne 
Frapp e. 



Spanish Mackerel a la Maitre 

d'Hotel. I Chateau 

Soft-shell crabs farcies. | Yquem. 

Tomato and Cucumber Salad. 
Saddle of Mutton. \ 
Filet de Boeuf a la V Claret. 
Milanaise. ) 

Petites timbales aux Champignons. 
Cotelettes d'Agneau a la Puree de Marrons. 
Terrapin. 
Kiz de Veau. 
Koman Punch. 
Champagne, f Canvas-back Ducks ^ 
Johannis- -j Squabs, Quail 
berger. 



Madeira. 

Sherry. 

Madeira. 

Port. 



Burgundy, 



} German wines. 
Steinberger. 

Asparagus. 
Broiled Mushrooms on Toast. 

Artichokes, with sauce. Port. 

Cabinet Pudding. 
Tutti Fruitti. 
Glaces, Dessert Fruit, j 
etc., etc. j 

Coffee. Liqueur. 

To attempt, however, to give bills of fare would 
be to crowd the book of etiquette. Only general 
rules can be laid down. In quiet places, where 
neither French cooking can be obtained nor is 
desired, let the hostess herself superintend, and 
her dinner may be as good as that of Del- 



TIIE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 



69 



monico. Her soup must fee made the day 
before, so that it will be free from grease, as pure 
as wine. Her fish must be fresh ; trout from 
the brook would be the very best in the world. 
Her roast must be perfectly cooked before the 
fire, not inside of a stove. Fresh flowers or ferns 
must adorn her clean table-cloth, and such fruits 
as are in season can be added as dessert. Her 
pudding, if made by her own fair hands, will be 
the best in the world ; and, above all, her tact 
and self possession, like her good bread and clear 
coffee, will make the guests forget the absence of 
expensive wines and rich viands. 

The ceremony of taking people in to dinner is 
this : The host goes first with the lady to whom 
the dinner is given, the hostess always last with 
principal gentleman guest. All the guests 
should have their places marked by a card, 
and in the hall or ante-room each gentle- 
man should find the card indicating which 
lady he is to take in to dinner. Thus, if 
Sir Edward and Lady Thornton asked General 
and Mrs. Grant to dinner, Sir Edward would 
go first, with Mrs. Grant ; after all the guests had 
entered, Lady Thornton would bring up the rear 



YO THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

with General Grant, whom she would place at her 
right hand, always the high seat of honor. No 
gentleman should wear a dress coat at an early 
dinner in the country; dress coats belong to 
seven o'clock dinners. 

The limitations of a dinner should be consid- 
ered. It is not kind to guests to keep them more 
than two hours at table. The French dinners 
never last more than one hour. English dinners 
are too long and too heavy. The Prince of 
Wales is setting the fashion of short dinners. In 
New York and Washington very elaborate din- 
ners last from seven to half -past ten, and are 
sometimes very tiresome. 

It is better to serve coffee in the drawing-room, 
although, at informal dinners, it is served at the 
table. Gentlemen remain to smoke in the dining- 
room in some houses ; in others they are taken to 
a library or smoking-room. The practice cf the 
ladies retiring first is an English one. French- 
men consider it barbarous. It is, however, prac- 
ticed in the best horses of New York and 
Washington, and it is a question if the ladies do 
not like it as well as the gentlemen. They enjoy 
a little chat by themselves. 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 71 



CHAPTER V. 

STATE DINNERS, FORMAL DINNERS, AKD FAMOUS 

DINNERS. 

IT is strange that the Russians, so lately re- 
deemed from barbarism, have taught the 
world how to serve a dinner. All diplomatic 
dinners, all state dinners, and most fashionable 
dinners, are served d la Russe ; which means that 
nothing appears on the table to eat, but all is 
landed by the servants from a side table or from 
behind a screen. 

General Washington probably carved his own 
turkey, even at a state dinner, but President 
Hayes does not know at all what he is to have for 
his dinner until he looks at the menu by his side, 
which was laid there by his butler. 

The dinner-table is merely a splendid picture, 
which remains a picture to the end, unless some 
one is so unlucky as to overturn a glass of claret 
on the table-cloth. The epergne or centrepiece 
in England is generally a splendid piece of silver, 
covered with flowers and fruits, with a "hot- 



72 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

house pine " somewhere in it or about it. Fine 
candelabra and vases are at either end, and 
dishes, holding sugar plums and dried can- 
died fruit, are at the four corners. Very 
handsome pitchers of glass, holding wine, 
"* <1 elegant decanters are allowable. In 
fact, everything ornamental is allowed, and 
nothing that can by use become unseemly is ad- 
mitted to such a dinner. We all know how 
disorderly, at certain moments, a dinner looks 
at which the carving and helping at table are 
allowed. In the dinner d la Jiusse the table always 
looks well, for the plate before each guest, con- 
stantly renewed, is alone responsible for any 
viand. The company enter, as we have said, the 
host .first, with the lady to Avhom the dinner is 
given, and his guests follow, each gentleman 
standing behind his lady's chair until the hostess 
has entered and taken ber seat. They find before 
them oysters or clams on the half-shell, on 
majolica plates, with bits of lemon in the centre 
of the plate. The servants pass red and black 
pepper and salt. These are removed and two 
soups are passed, so that each guest has a choice 
of soups. These removed, two choices of fish 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 73 

are offered to each guest, and so on, through an 
elaborate dinner of from ten to sixteen courses, 
the table meanwhile remaining a beautiful, fresh 
thing, with flowers and fruits and charming objets 
Wart to look at. The butler should always place 
the principal dish for a moment before the hostess, 
that she may signify by a nod if she is pleased 
with it. 

Books of etiquette sometimes elaborately tell 
people how to use a napkin and how to hold a 
fork. Cut it seems incredible that in the nine- 
teenth century anybody can be ignorant of these 
simple customs. If there is such a person, let 
him know that it is not etiquette to pin a napkin 
up to his coat, or to spread it over his breast. It 
should be across his knees, convenient to his 
hand. The fork should always be held in the right 
hand for eating oysters, peas, or anything that is 
to bs conveyed to the mouth, and only trans- 
ferred to the left hand when meat is to be cut, 
and it is needed to steady the morsel. 

In Europe, particularly in Germany, very well- 
bred people still eat with the knife ; but in this 
country, in France and England, it is semi-bar- 
barous to bring the knife in contact with the lips. 



14 THE AMEkICAN CODE OP MANNERS. 

It often shocks well-bred Americans to see a Ger- 
man princess carry cauliflower, peas or potato 
salad to her delicate mouth on the poini; of a 
silver knife, but such a sight is possible. It 1* 
very ugly, and should be avoided here. 

The custom of serving dinner's d la Busse should 
prevent any one from asking for a dish a second 
time ; indeed, this is never done at a state din- 
ner. There is little need of it. 

We have spoken of the epergne. The fancy 
now, in this country, is to replace the high orna- 
ments by low baskets of flowers, and to do away 
with everything which prevents conversation 
across the table. Low dishes of majolica, crys- 
tal and silver are liked by some. Very many opu- 
lent hostesses have the table entirely covered 
with flowers, and only a space left for the plate, 
knives, forks and glasses of each guest. This is 
very beautiful, especially in mid- winter, and for a 
round table, which is very sociable, it is quite 
charming. But the high epergne is very stately, 
and makes a table always look well. A pretty 
and simple epergne, which holds flowers for every 
day, is always a charming object. 

Be very careful to avoid mistakes as to the hciw 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 75 

of a dinner. Five minutes grace was all that 
General Washington allowed, and we could fol- 
low his example in this as in larger things. A 
half hour's delay spoils the fish and makes the 
^ook lose his temper. One great " diner out," in 
New 7ork, always carries his invitations with 
him, so that if he seems late or early he may de- 
fend himself in his own eyes by glancing at it in 
the hall. 

A small boutonniere or bunch of flowers awaits 
him with a card in an envelope, which tells a 
gentleman, before entering the parlor, which lady 
he is to take in to dinner. If he does not know 
her, he must whisper this to the hostess, who 
will present him to the lady. 

At a dinner, forget all animosities. If you are 
seated next to your deadliest enemy, talk and 
laugh and make yourself agreeable, to spare your 
host and hostess annoyance. Everybody is 
bound to be as agreeable as he can for the benefit 
of the whole mass. 

Be careful, if you have not experienced serv- 
ants, to instruct them in everything before din- 
ner. Plave plenty of side tables and sideboards, 
where the extra dishes, knives, forks, plates, 



76 



THE AMEKICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 



spoons and glasses may be found. Have extra 
napkins at hand to replace one which may be 
stained with wine. No condiments should ever 
be put on a table except salt, of which every 
guest should have a little private silver cell be- 
fore him. After the meats and game, a servant 
should go with a crumb scraper, removing the 
crumbs, and another with a sliver salver to re- 
move all the glasses, except those for sherry or 
Madeira, or a goblet for ice water, all ladies 
liking ice water in America. 

The butler mentions the name of the wine 
before pouring it. ' It you do not wish it, 
touch your glass with your finger, with a motion 
which checks him. It is proper to ask for bread, 
for water, or for champagne, at a dinner. These 
substances alone seeming to be always desirable, 
and served ad libitum. 

The host has his duty plainly marked out before 
him. Above all things he must be attentive to 
the ladies on either side of him ; he must encour- 
age the timid, draw out the silent, throw the ball 
of conversation down the table, remember every 
man's specialty and draw him out; he must 
try to simulate ease and frankness, and Ion- 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 71 

hommie, even if tie has not these virtues ; he 
must never show temper, even if the butler is 
drunk. Let a host avoid all "boasting of his wines ; 
he can mention their age, and beg of his guest to 
taste his " Steinberger of '46," or his "Claret 
of the Comet year," or his "Old Warrior Ma- 
deira," but he should not show ostentation, or 
remark upon the cost of anything. The model 
host makes himself only felt by his munificence, 
as a stream announces its presence by the ver ■ 
dure along its banks. But all hosts are not mil- 
lionaires, and yet would like to give dinners. 

A maid-servant in a neat cap and apron can 
be taught to serve a dinner as well as a man. 
She can have a side table on which she de- 
posits the soup tureen, and from which she 
helps all the guests. A maid-servant should 
be (if she is the waiter) taught to carve, so 
that she can save her employer all trouble. Two 
women often serve a dinner elegantly in Eng- 
land, and can be taught to do so in this country. 
The great point is to have things done neatly 
and quietly. 

If a gentleman still chooses (like General Wash- 
ington) to do his own carving, he should have his 



78 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

knife sharp and learn to cut a joint or a bird sit- 
ting. Ladies often carve elegantly, and it was 
considered indispensable by our grandmothers 
that every lady should have this accomplishment. 
It is however, rapidly going out, and nowadays 
the tea and coffee at breakfast are often served 
from a side table, and all the dishes passed to the 
guests even at breakfast. 

The objection to the old fashion is that it takes 
away the attention of the hostess from her guests 
if she has to serve every dish. Certainly for a 
large dinner, a ceremonious dinner, it would be 
impossible. 

A dinner table should not be crowded. If the 
room is large enough, a dinner of twenty-four is 
just as agreeable often as a dinner of ten. It de- 
pends on the companion next to you in all cases. 

On rising from the table the gentlemen some- 
times accompany the ladies to the parlor, and 
then return to smoke, and sometimes only go to 
the door, always remaining standing till the 
ladies have disappeared. 

Except at Washington, Albany, Harrisburg, or 
other cities where omcial position is especially 
recognized, we do not in this country observe 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. TO 

official rank at a dinner party. A governor or a 
mayor is asked to sit anywhere, without loss of 
consequence or dignity. Mrs. Stevenson may 
give a dinner to Mrs. Brown, and there may be 
a governor, an admiral, a mayor and a general in 
the company ; yet she takes in Mr. Brown. That 
is our republican way of doing things. In Wash- 
ington there must be some show of respect to the 
Diplomatic Corps; but even there, senators, 
judges and even foreign Ministers sit wherever 
their hostess chooses to place them. 

The President, of course, being our highest 
official, is always the guest at any house which 
he chooses to visit, and he should never be asked 
to sit anywhere but at the right hand of the 
hostess. To him and to his family the American 
people always give willing precedence. 

The menu, or bill of fare, is generally written 
in French, as our cooks are generally men of 
foreign birth, who understand that language bet- 
ter than any other. It is a pity that there is not 
an English vocabulary for these delicate dishes 
which form the staple of our splendid dinners. 
Yet French is generally understood. To trans- 
late it literally makes great nonsense. People 



80 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

must learn that " vol au vent de volaille " means 
simply chicken pie, and that " cotelettes a la 
financiere " are nothing but mutton chops with 
truffles and coxcombs, and that " pommes de 
terre aux maitre d'hotel " are simply boiled po- 
tatoes, and so on. The knowledge is easily ac- 
quired. 

Colored cooks are notably good ones. The 
Baltimore cookery is world-renowned ; and that of 
New England, where recipes were handed from 
generation to generation, was sometimes exqui- 
site. We need not be dependent on French cook- 
ery. But there is an American ignorance which 
is startling on the subject of cookery, and if 
ladies do not study it as an art, it will, in the 
rural districts, be soon impossible to get a good 
dinner. 

To fry things, to bake meats in hot ovens, to 
abjure the gridiron, to ruin a beefsteak and to 
kill the juicy excellence of a roast, these are our 
national sins. To cook indigestible lumps of pas- 
try, to feed a nation on pies, on heavy bread — 
who can expect greatness, wisdom or honesty 
from a nation of moody dyspeptics ? 

The dinner question is in the hands of the 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 81 

women. What woman does not like to see her 
table neat and attractive ? How many aids she 
has now, in the beauty of the modern glass and 
china, the profusion and cheapness of flowers, 
the excellence of canned vegetables, making her 
independent of the seasons, and in the profusion 
of the American markets. Foreigners say that 
we throw away enough at any meal to support 
another family. 

Dinner cards have come in, in great variety, on 
which the visitor's name can be written. These, 
painted, etched, engraved and ornamented with 
flowers, feathers and Japanese figures, are in 
tremendous variety at all stationers and jewelers. 
Those are the prettiest which are done by the 
young people of the house or the lady herself, 
with quotations from Shakespeare or the poets. 
They show a personal thought, which is always 
complimentary. One should read of famous dim 
ners. There is an account in Brillat Savarin's 
"Book on Taste" ("Physiologic du Gout")-< 
a charming account by Lady Morgan of 
a dinner at Baron Rothschild's, which is 
worth reading now, to see how little the 
formal European dinner has changed. Charles 



82 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

Lever's books are full of dinners, and so are Bul- 
wer's. The Englishman considers that he has 
done his duty by you if he asks you to dinner, 
and nowhere does a man of good English position 
appear so well as at his own dinner table. The 
best of everything he has is at your disposal. 

The old, inconvenient habit of changing the 
table-cloth is done away with ; the guests are not 
now troubled. That was the result of the " carv- 
ing-at-table" process, which was likely to endan- 
ger the purity of the cloth. If all the meats are 
carved elsewhere the cloth remains immaculate. 

The fashion of drinking healths has passed 
away. The modern dinner is a very unceremo- 
nious thing compared with the dinner of General 
Washington's time. It has steadily increased in 
elegance and has decreased in ceremony and stiff- 
ness. 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 83 

CHAPTER VI. 

RECEPTIONS, TEAS, LUNCHEONS. 

THE " reception," so called in modern 
parlance, is simply a party by daylight. 
The gas is lighted, the daylight excluded ; the 
hostess and her intimate friends are in beautiful 
toilette, the gayest dresses, but always in " high 
neck," or corsage montant, as the French say, and 
with hair very much dressed. 

Then* female guests come in street dresses and 
bonnets ; their male friends in frock coats and 
gray trowsers — decidedly demi-toilette. This is 
an anomaly, as it is an anomaly that the bride is 
always in full evening dress, while the bridegroom 
is in morning costume ; but etiquette has so or- 
dained it, and etiquette must be observed. 

These entertainments are usually very large, 
and a splendid collation is served. They are 
liked by many housekeepers, as being the most 
convenient way of entertaining, and as saving the 
servants from being up late at night. 

The drawback to such entertainments is this ; 



84 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

very few gentlemen can spare the time to go in 
the daytime to make calls or visits. Therefore 
the attendance is largely feminine. 

The lady guests who attend wear dressy bon- 
nets — generally white ones — and a gown which 
is not too heavy, as the rooms are invariably 
too warm. A heavy cloak is thrown off in the 
hall, as it is dangerous to go out into the cold 
air with only the dress proper to such an atmo- 
sphere as an American house alone can create. 
The invitations to these receptions are formal, 
and are generally sent out in New York a fort- 
night in advance. The form is as follows : 

Mrs. Majoribanks, 

At home. 

Wednesday, March 31st, 

From 3 to G. 

R. S. V. P. 17 E. Kent street. 

No response is necessary ; the hostess makes 
preparation for the number of guests whom she 
has invited. 

On entering, the guest maces a card on the 
table. If she cannot be present at the reception, 
she should send a card in an envelope. <*$ 

After these entertainments, which are parties, 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. So 

people should call ; but after the more informal 
"teas" now so fashionable, calls are not ex- 
pected. They were invented to save the per- 
son of voluminous acquaintance from the gene 
of making calls on all friends, which, in the 
great city of New York, becomes an impossi- 
bility. 

"Tea at four o'clock" is at once so cheap, 
and so easy a form of entertaining, that it 
is quite within the reach of every enter- 
tainer. A lady sends out her visiting card with 
the words written in one corner, ' ' Thursdays 
in April, tea at four o'clock," and she then 
quietly stays at home, with a tea-table spread, 
merely with the tea-urn, a few cups and saucers, 
and a basket of cake, and the claims of society 
are satisfied. She need do nothing further, 
nor make a call unless she chooses, for the 
season. 

It is a very pretty fashion, and if it could be 
kept to its original design, which was intended to 
supplement the great ball and the large reception, 
it would be well. 

Unfortunately, it has been considered as a prec- 
edent by those who could do more for society, 



86 THE AMERICAN CODE OP MANNERS. ' 

and has been turned into an evening party by the 
hostess, who thus escapes expense and trouble. 
Also, but one " tea" is given, when 'many should 
be allowed, to make up for the distance and the 
numberless "teas" which on Saturdays, in the 
season, conflict with each other. 

On certain days of the cold winter of 1878-79, 
often nine " teas" were announced for one Sat- 
urday. It was impossible to "do" them all, and 
there was very little amusemen; to be derived 
from any of them, if done hastily. 

But, as they are convenient, they will always re- 
main fashionable in the great crowded cities. 
Only let it be observed that these are not parties, 
and therefore they do not need the subsequent 
ceremony of a card — if a person has attended the 
original "tea." 

It too often becomes the fashion to substitute 
elaborate dressing on the part of the ladies of the 
family at these teas for the plain dress which 
merely an " at home" demands, and to make them 
gas-lighted, crowded and disagreeable pretenses 
for parties, when they should remain only " teas " 
or quiet " at homes." 

A young lady should never issue her own card 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 



87 



for a reception or tea. If she is motherless, her 
card should read thus : 

Mr. and Miss Charpentier, 

At home, 

Thursday, February 2d, 

At 3 o'clock, 

etc., etc. 

Or her chaperon should send the card, with 
the young lady's card inclosed. 

Numerals are only permitted in dates, hours 
and street numbers. Elisions are not permitted 
at all, or abbreviations. Let your friend see that 
you linger as long as possible over your note ; it 
is a respectful compliment. 

The invitation to a luncheon usually requires 
an answer. " R. S. V. P." is usually appended. 
When it is not, one may presume that the lady 
has asked so many that she does not require an 
answer, and that the luncheon is. to be served as 
a collation to every one who approaches the 

table. 

There are very few persons, however, who are 
offended at punctiliousness, and therefore, if a 
person wishes to send a regret or an acceptance 



88 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

to such an invitation, it is proper to do so. But 
no leader of society is offended at the omission, 
unless, of course, it be an invitation to dinner, or 
to a. " sit down lunch," and to those invitations 
" R. S. V. P." is always appended. 

Young gentlemen should make an evening call, 
in full dress, some time within a month after being 
invited to a reception, dinner or lunch, on the 
lady who has invited them. If they get in, the 
call should last less than an hour ; if they do not 
get in, but leave a card, their visit will be properly 
commended and set down to their credit by their 
amiable hostess. 

Many ladies are now introducing dancing at day 
receptions and at " teas." Music is also added as 
an attraction. In a crowded room, where people 
are coming and going, this is objectionable, as 
there are few who enjoy music while being inter- 
rupted, and few houses are large enough for 
dancing and receiving. The hostess is also dis- 
tracted by having to listen to both talk and music. 
The only place where this can be well done is at 
Newport, where the houses are large, the com- 
pany so familiar with each other, and, with the 
customs of the place, that all arrive about the 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 89 

same time. At a reception to the President or 
any distinguished man, everybody is bound to be 
punctual. The card should set forth the hour. 
The most distinguished lady in the United States 
has her hour engraved thus: " At half-past 
nine precisely r ," and her example may be well 
followed. 

The table may groan with all the luxuries, or it 
may simply bear a few sandwiches, ices, coffee, 
tea, chocolate, punch and oysters, as the lady 
pleases. Heavy and elaborate day lunches are 
unhealthy and interfere with a seven-o'clock 
dinner. A well-bred host errs on the side of 
plainness rather than that of a heavy over- 
munificence. 

Ladies should not wear jewelry in the morning, 
particularly at their own houses. The hostess 
should always be plainly dressed, so that her 
guests be not made to feel ashamed of a quiet 
toilette. 

Evening parties are far more formal, and re- 
quire the best and most elaborate dress. Every- 
one who can wear alow cut dress {decollete) should 
do so. At an evening party in New York, people 
go at eleven o'clock— a ridiculously late hour— 



90 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

unless the hostess defines the hour, as is often 
done, in this way : 

Mrs. Campbell, 

At home, 

Thursday evening, March 17th. 

From 9 to 11. 

R. S. V. P. 

Some sticklers for a perfect etiquette say that 

no lady has a right to demand an answer to an 

"at home;" she should say, if she expects an 

answer : 

Mrs. Campbell 

Requests the pleasure 

Of Mrs. So-and-So's Company 

On Thursday evening, 

etc., etc. 

No doubt this is the most \>3rfect form, but so 
long as ladies do append " R. S. V. P." to an 
" at home," they should receive an answer. 

At a reception the lady alone receives, the host 
walks about among his guests ; the sons and 
daughters make themselves generally agreeable. 

If the reception is given to some distinguished 
person, ;hen the lady simply stands beside her 
guest / fco present all the company to him, or her. 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. V*l 

There are exceptions to this rule, of course — if 
Illness or indisposition to society prevent thy 
hostess from receiving — but so long as she w 
in good health and chooses to invite people 
she is a perfect queen. It is she who invites the 
guests, she who presides, who defines the laws of 
her household, and of her feasts. It is to her 
that all the honors are paid ; the host, for the 
time being, playing but a secondary part. No 
fact defines so admirably the civilization of the 
nineteenth century as this — the pre-eminence of 
women. A man dresses himself plainly, but puts 
diamonds on his wife. In savage communities 
it is the male who wears the fine clothes, and the 
female who digs the earth and waits upon her 
lord, standing behind him wmile he eats. In the 
etiquette of society that savage fashion is re- 
versed. 

The etiquette of musical parties demands first, 
punctuality, then silence while the music is 
being played or sung. Nothing is so ill-bred 
as to talk or to move about while a song is 
going on. 

No lady who gives a musicale should invito 
more than she can seat comfortably, and sht? 



92 THE AMERICAN COBB OF MANNERS. 

should have her rooms cool, and her lights soft 
and shaded. People with weak eyes suffer 
dreadfully in the glare of gas ; and when music 
is going on they cannot stir to relieve themselves. 
Who can endure the mingled misery of a hot 
room, an uncomfortable seat, a glare of gas and 
a pianoforte solo ? 

A very sensible reformation is now iri 
progress in regard to the sending of in- 
vitations and the answering of the same. 
The post is now freely used as a safe and con- 
venient medium, and one that never fails. Until 
very lately men were hired to take notes, and 
servants were sent with all dinner invitations and 
their replies. This being found utterly imprac- 
ticable in small families, or by young gentlemen 
living, as most young gentlemen do live, in large 
cities, messenger boys were employed. 

This was found to be very unsafe, as messenger 
boys are wholly irresponsible, and if they lose a 
note they never tell of it. 

Therefore, it has come about that notes may be 
sent by post, as in London or Paris, without loss 
of caste. 

No one is obliged, of course, to send by post, 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS, DJ 

but it is much safer and often more expeditious, 
and there is no rule of etiquette broken. 

For "teas" it is much better than sending by- 
private messenger. A lady has a great number of 
cards to send, she has but to spend a morning in 
directing her notes and in appending the little 
postage stamp, or she may readily commit that 
duty to an intelligent servant, the notes are de- 
posited in a neighboring lamp-post, and are quite 
sure to reach their destination. 

The etiquette of the ball-room is scarcely 
greater than that of an evening party. No young 
lady should go without a chaperon to either. 
When at the ball she sits by her chaperon until 
asked to dance ; she then, after the dance, returns 
to her. 

A young gentleman can go to a lady friend and 
request to be introduced to a young lady, or he 
can request the patrons of the ball to present 
him. A lady's permission should always be asked 
before a gentleman is presented. A short walk 
after the dance is permitted, and a talk in the 
parlors adjacent to the ball-room ; but it is not 
etiquette for a gentleman to take a lady off for 
the whole evening from her chaperon, 



04 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

No gentleman should go into a supper-room 
alone, or help himself while one lady remains un- 
served. Young American gentlemen are very ill- 
bred in this matter sometimes, and the supper 
room looks like an arena of gluttony. Let all 
men remember while in society that they are 
there as the knights, the attendants on the fairer 
portion of creation, and not to eat, drink and be 
merry as at the large men's dinners, suppers and 
club entertainments. 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 95 



CHAPTER VIL 

WHO SHOULD BOW FIRST? WHO SHOULD SPEAK 
^IRST ? WHO SHOULD CALL FIRST ? 

THERE is much unnecessary questioning on 
these subjects, much unnecessary heart- 
burning. 

We are on a sliding scale in America. No one 
knows with thorough exactitude where he stands, 
socially, as every one may from the humblest po- 
sition rise to the very highest. Therefore, if a per- 
son have assumption, arrogance, pretension, he 
may assume to be a great personage, and may, 
by his manner, hurt the feelings of some other 
humbler person. We call such a person a snob, 
and he deserves the odious name. 

The highest born and the most distinguished 
persons in Europe have the best, the most gra- 
cious and the least assuming manners. When Earl 
de Grey and Ripon was here, at the period of the 
"High Joint Commission" in Washington, he 
said "that General and Mrs. Grant had the man- 
ners of kings and queens," so simple and unpre- 



96 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

tending were they, so kindly and cordial to every- 
body. Now some "nouveaux riches'''' in New 
York (and it is to be feared in other cities) are 
not so unpretending as was the great soldier and 
his quiet wife. They assume an air of lofty dis- 
dain, affect not to know those whom they do 
know perfectly well, and ignore their own past. 
Such people are not personages of refined so- 
ciety — they are vulgar snobs. 

The lady who is fully aware of her own good 
birth and breeding, w T ho has had respectable an- 
cestors, and who has lived always in good society, 
is never afraid to bow first, to call first, and to 
speak first. She knows that courtesy is the most 
beautiful virtue ; that politeness should be enu- 
merated among the seven capital virtues, and 
that she is not hurt if the person to whom she 
bows does not bow back. 

Now, some young gentlemen, with a very 
proper modesty, assume that it is not their place 
to bow to a lady until she bows to them ; but 
here they are wrong. The mistake arises from a 
too great respect, and from an ignorance of the 
world. A lady, particularly an elderly one, and 
a society leader perhaps, has so many accquaint- 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 9? 

ances that she does not remember all the young 
men who hare been presented. She is never 
offended if a young man raises his hat to her and 
claims an acquaintance which it would give her 
infinite pleasure to acknowledge did not memory 
fail to bring the face and name together. A gen- 
tleman should always bow first to a lady, no 
matter whether she returns it or not. If he sees 
by her face that she does not wish to return it, 
he can refrain from bowing the next time. 
Young men ^re generally chivalrous, respectful 
?■ ad humble, that is, young men who are gentle- 
men. Let them not be afraid to bow first. It is 
a courtly grace to bow well to a woman. It has 
the authority of Sir Walter Raleigh behind it. 

Now, as for calling first, the etiquette in Wash- 
ington is very definite : the latest comer calls first. 
It is a thousand pities that this is not the custom 
in every town, it would simplify matters so much. 
But in New York it is the fashion for the oldest 
resident to make the first advances, although now 
new people, if they choose, send their card for a 
tea or a reception, and await the action of the 
social leader, whose acquaintance is thus grace- 
fully solicited. If this attention is not returned. 



yS THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

the lady who Sas seat the first card sends no 
more, naturally. 

"To get on in society" involves so much that 
cannot be written down, that here any manual of 
etiquette is necessarily imperfect, for no one can 
predict who will succeed and who will fail. Bold, 
arrogant, selfish and presumptuous people some- 
times succeed and sometimes fail ; there seems 
to be no rule. 

But it is quite safe to say, " do nothing that be- 
trays any want of self-respect ; neither push nor 
recede." Do your part toward the social pleas- 
ures of your set, and leave the rest to fate. 
Some people are always laughed at ; some are 
wrongfully put down ; some are most mysteri- 
ously successful. No one can tell why ; but one 
thing is quite certain, no one loses anything by a 
modest, serene courtesy, a civility which never 
flags, a willingness to put the very best interpreta- 
tion on all the conduct of society. 

For many of the so-called "slights which 
patient merit of the unworthy takes" come 
from our overcrowded social life. A popular 
person, a social leader, soon becomes a person of 
many engagements, and with more to do than 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 90 

she can do properly. Forgive such a person a 
long time for any seeming incivility ; remember 
that she cannot be always ready to return your 
visit, nor is she always able to remember your 
face. Therefore be not afraid if you are a new- 
comer to impress yourself upon such a desired ac- 
quaintance by acts of civility, and by the most 
courteous attentions. They will not be mis- 
taken for " snobbery," if neither of you are 
snobs. 

In England, where people are never introduced 
at a dinner, everybody speaks to his next neigh- 
bor, or the person opposite, without introduc- 
tion, and with delightful courtesy. There is no 
restraint as in America, where two ladies will 
meet and gaze at each other as if they belonged 
to hostile tribes of Indians and are seeking each 
other's scalps, if perchance they have not been 
introduced. 

Eemember that the house wherein you are is a 
sufficient introduction ; speak to each other, 
make it agreeable for your hostess, even if on 
going down the front steps you should never 
speak again. It is proper etiquette to ex- 
change the common-places of courtesy without 



100 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

being introduced when you are in a friends 
house. 

A truly hospitable hostess does introduce, ii f 
she sees shyness or true humility on the faces of 
her young guests. It is not etiquette for her to 
introduce two New York ladies to each other if 
they are in such a position that they might pos- 
sibly know each other and yet do not. But it is 
proper for them to speak to each other in her 
parlor. 

It is always proper for a young lady to call first 
on an older one ; always proper for everybody to 
call first on the family of a clergyman. Age and 
the clergy are our two orders of nobility. 

It is always proper for a gentleman to take off 
his hat when he meets a lady on a hotel stair, at 
the box of a theatre or opera, or any place where 
they are brought into unexpected meeting. In 
France all men uncover before a funeral cortege 
or in the presence of death. It is a beautiful 
custom. 

In driving, a gentleman touches his hat with 
his whip. He could not well take off his hat 
while driving, although some very respectful men 
do. But the etiquette of the whip is sufficient. 



THE AMEPJCAlV CODE OF MANNERS. 101 

There are many excellent persons who are ex- 
clusive both, by nature and by their prominent 
positions. If they were not, should we value 
them so much ? No, certainly not. We like a 
hostess who is so exclusive that she shuts out 
bores and adventurers, rude or disagreeable 
people, and only lets in the well-bred, the quiet, 
the deserving. 

"AH front doors should have a coarse sieve 
before them," said an old entertainer, " all 
society is not good society." So there is much to 
be said for those hostesses who are not easy of 
approach. There is a vast difference between 
the pretensions of a snob and the exclusivcness 
of a Lady Palmerston. She was the queen of 
the political salon for many years, yet no one ever 
called her rude or too accessible. She knew ex- 
actly where to draw the line. We have some 
such model hostesses in America. They are very 
rare anywhere, but they preserve society. 

Lady Waldegrave was said to possess in perfec- 
tion Vart de tmir salon. She was never afraid to 
bow iirst, to call first, to speak first. She knew 
the value of courtesy. Although the daughter of 
Braham, the singer, made wealthy and ennobled 



102 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

by her marriages, she was respected and admired 
by the whole British aristocracy, where there is 
more pride of birth than anywhere else in the 
world, because she respected herself and had 
good manners. 

A gentleman who is walking with a lady or 
driving with her should lift his hat to every one 
to whom she bows, even if he does not know the 
person to whom the lady bows. It is a respect to 
her. A truly polite person also always returns a 
bow, even if he does not know the person bow- 
ing. It may be a mistake in identity, etc. 

General Washington was once reproved for his 
politeness to an aged negro, who had bowed very 
low. 

"Do you suppose," said the great man, "that 
I wish to be outdone in politeness ?" 

Now there are instances when a lady must cut 
a former acquaintance. Let this be done promptly 
and peremptorily. Look the offender in the face 
and recognize her fully, but do not bow. This 
happens when we lose confidence in a character, 
have experienced rudeness, or are assured that 
we have been mistaken in the respectability of a 
man or a woman. Let no half courtesy continue, 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 103 

but break at once. If there were more of this 
sincerity society would be much more agreeable. 
A lady of high position has to do this thing 
sometimes more than once. She cannot and 
should not forgive a liar, a cheat or an adven- 
turer. 

There are adventurers of both sexes. There is 
no punishment greater than a "cut" from a 
prominent, good and respected woman. 

Cardinal Antonelli never recovered from the 
slight which the Roman princesses put upon him. 
They all refused to bow to him, in spite of his 
exalted power, knowing the lowness of his origin 
and the vileness of his character. There are im- 
pertinences which must be put down at once, and 
no hostess should suffer anybody to be imperti- 
nent in her house if she can help it. 

There are women in society called "social 
marauders ' ' who presume upon an acknowledged 
eccentricity to insult the humble, or the fearful, or 
the polite. Such a woman should be left out. 
She should not be invited. The sieve at the front 
door should exclude her. Every social leader 
owes it to herself to frown down such a woman, 
and to exclude from her parties men of notori- 



j.04 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

ously bad character, even though they may have 
family and wealth to make them famous. 

In the case of distinguished strangers a resi- 
dent of a town should call first. 

Nor if the stranger is to be but a short time 
in town should one expect a return. A card, in 
an envelope, is often all that a person can send as 
the acknowledgment of this civility. 

To invite a stranger to dinner is the best civil- 
ity ; if that be impossible, try to offer him tickets 
for a box at the opera, or a good play, or some- 
thing exclusive which he could not reach but for 
you. 

After a death in the family it is the custom for 
all friends to call within a month, or to send 
cards. These attentions are noticed and deeply 
felt. 

Also in cases of prolonged sickness ; send often 
to inquire for the patient, with your card, on 
which may be penciled " Kind inquiries," or the 
word " Sympathy," as one pleases. 

If a gentleman wishes to be presented to a lady, 
she should say " Thank you," and show pleasure 
as he advances. She need not know him again if 
he does not please her, but she owes a polite 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 105 

recognition of anybody to the lady who intro- 
duces. 

In this respect our American women are very 
lacking in good manners, often receiving a new 
acquaintance with a brusque discourtesy or an 
indifferent coldness, which shows themselves to 
be ill-bred. The true lady is always deferen- 
tial, polite, and easy in her manners. 

The manners of men toward women partake of 
the freedom of the age. The jeunesse dore'c are 
not shy of their attractions ; they believe, evi- 
dently, that they are attractive. Therefore, they 
are sometimes wanting in politeness, particularly 
at crowded bails, to ladies. This is a sin of 
manner rather than of heart, and a little thought 
will correct it. 

In advising people to be not shy of making 
first visits, let no one suppose that we advo- 
cate " push." There are perfect instincts in 
this matter which should always tell us 
where we should not go first. If a person is 
so much richer, more distinguished, and more 
socially prominent than ourselves that the line is 
very distinctly drawn, of course we should not 
make violent efforts to achieve that acquaintance. 



106 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS 

We should wait until some mutual friend has 
paved the way for us, and we should be as firm 
in our self-respect as our expected acquaintance 
is firm in her social position. 

In this country wealth has, although it gives 
prominence, really very little power of stamping 
out the claims of character, old family, good 
breeding and culture ; a nouveau riche still aims to 
fill her rooms with those who bring the gifts 
which no money can buy. " An old aristocrat M 
(although it seems a misnomer) is still a power in 
the newest State ; a woman or a man who has 
education and good manners can afford to laugh 
at poverty, and can, with tact and courtesy, 
always be a favorite in society. Of course wealth 
is necessary-, if one would entertain much, in a 
great city. But even in the commercial metrop- 
olis wealth has not stamped out those higher quali- 
ties which should ever reign in our society — tact, 
good breeding and courtesy. 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 10? 



CHAPTER VIII. 

CONDUCT IN A CROWD. 

THE American woman is said to behave 
badly in a crowd. She is nervous, push- 
ing, selfish, aggressive. The entrance to a 
matinee at the Academy of Music, when the 
audience is almost exclusively feminine, is as 
dangerous and as desperate a place as one can 
find. Women's elbows are freely planted in 
a neighbor's side, and the old pun of infra dig 
comes to mind. Every woman seems to have 
forgotten that she is a lady, and pushes forward 
as brutally as if she were an English prize- 
fighter. A child is often in great danger in these 
crowds, and the sight is often seen of a mother 
and an aunt protecting some unhappy little thing 
whom these stampeding crowds would tread to 
death. 

Now, this is not because women are cruel ; it 
is because they are thoughtless. Many an acci- 
dent has occurred at these matinees from over- 
crowding, and each woman who went to make 



108 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

up the crowd probably would have regretted 
deeply did she know that it was her arm that 
wounded the delicate chest of a feeble sister. 
But each woman was anxious to get a seat, each 
woman was nervous, each woman thought her- 
self as good as any other woman, and each 
woman felt angry at being "crowded," so that a 
mass of agitation was the net result. 

Now, to behave well in a crowd calls for a vast 
deal of presence of mind. A smiling face, a 
pleasant voice, an apology to the woman whom 
you are unintentionally pushing ; these things go 
a long way toward saving you and her. Of 
course a crowd is a heedless and a dreadfully 
dangerous thing, and prudent women keep out 
of it ; but, if once in, nothing but good temper 
is of any avail. 

But there are crowds in other places than at 
the door of a theatre ; there are crowds in ball- 
rooms, at public receptions, and at the House of 
Representatives. There are crowds on the Fifth 
avenue, in the cars of the elevated railway and 
at me fashionable fairs, in a church at a wedding, 
and at private theatricals. Foreigners think that 
our American women are too much en eviclen.ee> 



TEE AMEKICAN CODE OF MANHEK3. 100 

and that they are too bold in their manners. 
Now, there is no doubt but that the very inno- 
cence and frankness of young girls are some- 
times mistaken for boldness, particularly by men 
who are prone to see evil in everything. An ab- 
sence of self-consciousness is a charming thing, 
but in a crowd a young lady must remember that 
she is in the midst of a very severe and scathing 
criticism, and that she must think how she is look- 
ing and how she appears. She must not laugh 
loud or fast, or show coquetry or boldness. 

At a fancy fair she must not walk about impor- 
tuning men to buy things or to take chances in a 
rafne. It really behooves our young ladies to 
watch their- looks and speech at these places* 
They can make as much money for the charity if 
they are reserved, courteous and plainly dressed, 
as if they were flaunting, bold and coquettish. 
Many women find these great crowds a fitting 
outlet for unoccupied energies, and for love of a 
little healthy excitement — and not being able to 
give money — they give what is far better, their 
time and talents, to a fancy fair ; but they are un- 
der severe criticism while serving at the altar of 
charity, and should remember to propitiate by 



4.10 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

every decent reserve that unmannerly critic, the 
public. 

It is astonishing that women, who have had 
offered to them the real crowns of culture and 
conduct, should ever accept these false, imitation, 
flashy jewels, called notoriety and conspicuous- 
ness ; and yet, with all good opportunities of 
gaining the former, too many young women ac- 
cept the latter. 

Eccentricity may be pardoned at home, but it 
is never forgiven when seen in crowds. 

Lady Bulwer, whose famous divorce suit from 
the great novelist has been so well described, for- 
got her dignity in crowds, and showed temper 
at a Queen's drawing room. At home no 
one could be more like an " untrained colt." 
She would sop up spilt ink with a beauti- 
ful twenty-guinea pocket-handkerchief, snap a 
gold chain into bits, upset fine china " in the 
torrent and tempest and whirlwind of her pas- 
sion." She presumed upon her rights as a belle, 
a beauty and a wit ; but, although her figure was 
superb, her great dark eyes as soft as velvet, and 
her features perfectly regular, society never for- 
gave her, and her husband very properly divorced 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. Ill 

her. She was always respected for her talents 
and her blameless private life, but she had no 
place in " the crowd." 

Women should not quarrel with each other in 
public. Everybody respects a woman who can 
smilingly keep her temper. It is doubtful if 
fashion is a very good adjunct to friendship, and 
female friendships are often but the result of 
propinquity, and not very deep. Eivalries arise, 
and coldness and quarrels are sometimes inevit- 
able. As much as we may labor to " keep our 
friendships in repair," we may not always suc- 
ceed, but the break should not be made public. 

It costs very little effort to be polite and re- 
served in a crowd, or perhaps we should say " in 
public ;" any display of temper is very improper, 
and totally subversive of etiquette. Women are 
apt to be very chivalrous in friendship, and to 
stand up bravely for an absent friend when at- 
tacked ; this is so fine a trait that we cannot 
much blame it ; but still, if it leads to quarrel- 
ing, or to loud talking, even that should be 
avoided. 

Women should not talk too much in a crowd, 
even if they talk well. Some one behind them 19 



112 THE AMERICAN CODE G* MANNERS. 

sure to think that they are talking for effect. 
There are many women who have high spirits and 
a perfect gift as to a compliment or a greeting, 
who have a combination of splendid talents, yet 
who are always exciting enmity and jealousy 
because they seem to the cankered and envious 
to be trying to take up too much of the public 
attention. There are women who can talk to 
four men at once, and yet make every man think 
himself the favored one ; women who have a 
talent at an epigram or a story, who have wit, 
and whose knowledge lies where they can easily 
find it. Such women are greatly sought for in 
society — they axe its ornaments • but, if such 
women are not on guard / if they laugh and talk 
in a crowd, at the opera, they are sure to be 
severely criticised. 

It is always in the power of a small and devoted 
band to stand back to back, and, with spears 
pointed outward, to defend a small and exclusive 
territory. Such may be the fortress of Fashion, 
to those who wish to enter that self-constituted 
fort. There may be danger of wounds. There 
is very little gained, perhaps, by getting into 
that strictly defended territory, but one likes to 



TIIE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 113 

conquer difficulties ; so, if one storms tLe fort, 
one must expect to encounter the bayonets of 
the defenders, They are "the crowd," and 
to propitiate that body, or to conquer it, a 
young aspirant for fashion must buckle on her 
armor. 

There is, no doubt, a great growth of antip- 
athies and hatred engendered by the pursuit of 
pleasure in the hot-house air of our best society. 
We are not angels at the best, and it is doubtful 
if a gay and idle pursuit of fashion and pleasure 
improves us. Still, the natural desire for social 
distinction is a very honest one — we ail want our 
rank ; but the cultivation of the graces which 
lead to social success seems to be accompanied 
Dy many false growths, and by those fungi which 
spring up in every rich soil. Therefore, as every 
pleasure is accompanied by a danger, the young 
aspirant for fashionable distinction should learn 
that a certain quiet, elegant reserve of manner is 
a perfect safety gauze mask, as much needed, 
morally, in the perilous air of the salon as the 
same protection is needed physically in the 
dangerous gas of a mine. We must learn to dis- 
arm criticism, and to look upon society as a 






114 THE AMERICAN CODE OE MANNERS. 

tournament, a field of the cloth of gold, where all 
the knights are allowed to enter with visor up 
and armor closed, to joust, to tilt as they please, 
"but not to disclose their innermost personalities. 
Good breeding gives us certain definite rules, and 
while these are observed, society is possible ; else 
it disintegrates. But we may, without losing 
self-respect, exercise a vast self-control, and not 
show that we distrust people, nor that we vastly 
like them ; we need not wear our hearts on our 
sleeves for daws to peck at. 

Members of the same family should never 
quarrel in public. This is often done by two 
sisters of uncertain tempers, and the crowd 
laughs. The French have a proverb about this, 
perhaps too well known to be quoted. 

Never show that you feel a slight. This is 
worldly wise as well as Christian, for no one but 
a mean person will put a slight on another, and 
such a person always prof oundly respects the per- 
son who is unconscious of his feeble spite. 
Never resent publicly a lack of courtesy ' it is in 
the worst taste. What you do privately about 
dropping such an acquaintance must be left to 
Yourself. 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS, 115 

To a person of noble mind the contests of so- 
ciety must ever seem poor and furious as they 
think of these narrow enmities and low political 
manoeuvres, but we know that they exist and 
that we must meet them. Temper, detraction 
and small spite are as vulgar on a Turkey carpet 
and in a palace as they could be in a tenement 
house ; nay, worse, for the educated contestants 
know better. But that they exist we know as 
well as we know that the diphtheria rages. We 
must only reflect philosophically that it takes all 
sorts of people to make a world ; that there are 
good people, rank and file ; that there is a valiant 
army and a noble navy; that there are also 
pirates who will board the best of ships, and 
traitors in every army, and that we must be ready 
for them all ; that if we live in a crowd we must 
propitiate that crowd. 

Never show a fractious or peremptory irri- 
tability in small things. Be patient if a friend 
keeps you waiting. Bear, as long as you can, 
heat, or a draught, rather than to make others 
uncomfortable. Do not be fussy about your 
supposed rights ; yield a disputed point of pre 
cedence. All society has to be made up of these 



110 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNEKft. 

concessions ; they make you unnumbered frienda 
in the long run. 

We are not always wrong when we quarrel ; 
but if we meet our deadliest foj at a friend'3 
house we are bound to treat him with perfect 
civility. That is neutral ground. Never, by 
word or look, disturb your hostess ; this is an 
occasional duplicity which is ordered by the 
laws of society. And, in all honesty, cultivate 
a graceful salutation, not too familiar, in a crowd. 
Do not kiss your friend in a crowd ; be grave 
and decorous always. Burke said that manners 
were more important than laws. " Manners are 
what vex or soothe, comfort or purify, exalt or 
debase, barbarize or refine us by a constant, 
steady, uniform, insensible operation , like the 
air we breathe." 

A salutation may have a great deal of meaning 
in it. It may say, " I respect you, and I wish 
you well." It may say, "I love you." It may 
say, "I hate you." In a crowd, it should sim- 
ply say the first. The bow of a young lady 
should be maidenly, quiet, not too demonstra- 
tive ; yet not cold or forbidding. 

The salutation of a man to a woman cannot be 



THE AMERICAN COPE OF MANNERS. 117 

% ct 

too respectful It is to "be feared that " old-fash- 
ioned courtesy " has noplace in our fashionable 
society. There is cither coldness or too great 
familiarity. The manners of young women are 
apt to be too careless. They emulate the manners 
of men and of the age too much, not remember- 
ing they should carry in their gentle ways the 
good manners of all ages. A young woman 
should remember that when a woman's saluta- 
tion ceases to be delicate, elegant and finished, 
that she steps down from her throne and throws 
away her sceptre. 

There is no salutation, however, more displeas- 
ing than that of a too efflorescent and flattering 
subserviency. "He bows too low " should never 
be said. Avoid being a snob, in private, as in a 
crowd. 

People of the highest fascination communicate 
a flattering salutation with their eyes. Such 
people need no words, they talk without know- 
ing it. 

A woman who fills a high place in society must 
be unselfish, considerate, full of memory, com- 
plaisant, amiable and honorable. She must do a 
thousand gracions things for which she will never 



113 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNEKS. 

be tnanked. She must stand at her post when 
dying 1 of fatigue ; she must talk to bores. The 
post of honor is the post of danger. She must 
submit to criticism. She must be attacked, 
suspected, called selfish, proud, conceited, false 
perhaps, although her constancy may be perfect, 
but she must not let the crowd know that she 
notices these adverse criticisms. They are the 
penalty of greatness. 

Never advertise your own failures. Never com- 
plain that you are not invited ; that you have 
been badly treated ; that you have made a mis- 
take ; that you regret your ow T n want of success. 
The crowd does not care. It is very apt to be- 
lieve that you are successful if you say nothing 
to the contrary ; it receives you at your own 
rating, and, unless you are abominably selfish, 
egregiously vain and pretentious, or dismally 
sulky, will almost always rate you as a good- 
enough person, sufficiently fashionable and well- 
bred. 

These ere very superficial and external hints as 
to the ethics of etiquette. We might go much 
deeper, and argue from a higher, better stand- 
point, but that is not necessary her©» 



TEE AMERICAN OOPS OF MAHHEBS. 139 



CHAPTER IX. 

TEE ETIQUETTE OE WEDDINGS, OE CALLS OF CON- 
G11ATULAT10N AND OF SYMPATHY. 

THE lady, of course, fixes the day for the 
wedding to suit herself. Much nonsense 
has been written about those papers "which 
are expected to gazette engagements or wedding 
davs." No paper is expected to " gazette " any- 
thing among well-bred people. The nrst inti- 
mation that the public receives of either fact 
should come from the parents of the bride, who 
mention the fact of the engagement to their 
intimate friends, and when the young couple 
are ready to marry, the father and mother, or 
guardians of the young lady, issue cards naming 
the day and hour of the wedding. 

It would be easy to write a volume, and it would 
he a most useful volume if it brought conviction 
to the hearts of the offenders, on the wrong done 
to young ladies by the newspapers, who assume, 
without authority, to publish the news of an en- 
gagement. Many a match haa been broken of? 



120 - THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNEBS, 

by such a premature surmise on the part of a not 
too well-informed reporter, and the happiness of 
one or more persons injured for life. For an en- 
gagement is a very delicate thing. Two people 
like to approach this event of their lives in great 
mutual confidence and secrecy. They do not 
wish to throw open those inner rooms of the heart 
for reporters to chronicle every detail of their 
furnishing. Consequently, all newspapers should 
be careful not to announce an engagement unless 
requested to, or unless they are particularly well 
informed as to the truth of it. Society, too, 
is very much to blame for its readiness to de- 
clare an engagement "off" without sufficient 
reason, and to circulate rumors prejudicial to 
the gentleman if an engagement is broken. This 
is often done, and it makes much unnecessary 
ill-feeling. 

A gentleman presents a lady with a ring after 
she has accepted him — a diamond generally — " a 
very large diamond, imported by Tiffany," as 
the author of "Miss Flora McFlimsy" puts it. 
According to the wealth of the high-contracting 
parties is the diamond large or small, and so of 
th3 trousseau of the bride. 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF M ANTHERS. 121 

• Unfortunately, in our "age of gold." money 
has become very much the important factor in 
modern matrimonial engagements, Flatus has 
long been a rival of Cupid, and some people say 
that the former has floored the latter. Let us 
hope, however, that young people still love each 
other : that the good old fashion of marrying for 
love is not entirely extinct. 

The custom of giving bridal gifts has, however, 
become now an outrageous abuse of a good thing. 
From being a very pretty custom, one which had 
at its base the good old reality of helping the 
young couple to begin housekeeping (which is 
still observed in Holland by presents of the bed 
and table linen and the necessary knives and 
forks and chairs), it has become but another form 
of ostentation, and a very great tax upon the 
friends of the bride. People are expected to send 
certain handsome gifts. Rich old relatives are 
mulcted, and the bride's mother has been known 
to write notes to the effect that " Nellie would 
prefer pearls," or that " Jane hopes everything 
will be silver "etc. 

Even if the family of the fair bride have too 
much delicacy to do this, a New York bride her. 



122 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERw. 

self had lately no sucli delicacy, but requested 
her friends to send Vier checks instead of presents, 
and she afterwards boasted that she had " got 
five thousand dollars out of one rich old man!" 
Then the rivalry between two rich families, or 
a rich and a poor family, begins. The Jonese3 
say that they must not be outdone by the Wil- 
liamses. So, if the Williamses send a silver din- 
ner-set the Joneses must send one also. Such arc 
the vulgar abuses of a good custom. 

The upshot of all this is that the young couple, 
perhaps having but a small income, are loaded 
down with silverware which they cannot use, and 
which becomes a bill of expense to them for 
years, for it must be stored, and the interest of 
the money, the insurance and storage, soon cat 
up the value of the silver. 

There is positively no advantage in all this, 
except to Tiffany, who daily sends out magnifi- 
cent silver, for which he is paid an enormous 
price, to receive it back the same evening, anci 
to keep it at the owner's expense for twelve 
years, perhaps forever. It ha 3 had one or 
two other uses. It has served to gratify some- 
body's love of display, or somebody's purse 



THE AMEXICAN CCBE OF MANNERS. 123 

pride, and the bride has glanced at it once. 
There are fourteen or fifteen young married 
women of twelve years' standing in. New York 
who say that they never saw their own silver 
except on the wedding day. The danger of 
losing it is so great, that with dishonest servants 
and burglars about they dare not keep it at home, 
and they cannot afford to give the large dinners 
which require it. 

Yet it is etiquette to send the bride a present- 
after the mother has announced that "Nellie will 
be married in March." and every one feels, not 
only a love for Nellie, but a sense of the dviy of 
the thing. It is no longer a mere pleasure, it is 
obligatory. 

If, like the announcement in the death column. 
14 It is requested that no flowers be sent." which 
has just stopped off a painful and unnecessary 
extravagance, the bridal cards could bear this 
inscription, " Tt is requested that no presents be 
sent," it would soon remedy this evil, and it is 
an evil deeply felt by those who cannot afford to 
be lavish ; and it is overdone by the very rich, 
who are simply gratifying their own vanity. 

No one need be afraid to help the young couple 



124 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

in an unostentatious way ; but the publicity of 
the thing, the notoriety and the extravagance, 
micM be properly checked. 

A very rich girl frequently gives the brides- 
maids their dresses. If she is not able to do this, 
she suggests what they shall wear. The groom 
gives the bridesmaids lockets or rings with mono- 
gram or motto, if he is able so to do, and presents 
each of his ushers with a scarf-pin or studs — 
something by which they shall remember the day, 

The fashion of groomsmen has passed away. 
Now the happy man stands at the altar awaiting 
his bride with his " best man" at his side. Six 
ushers, dressed in frock coats, gray pantaloons 
and dark scarfs, bring the ladies to their seats in 
church, and then form a procession at the door of 
the church to lead up the bridal party. These are 
followed by the bridesmaids, who walk two and 
two, bearing flowers, and now, generally, weai 
little bonnets. Then comes the bride, leaning on 
the arm of her father or brother, or on the arm 
of the friend who is to give her away. No one 
uhould wear a veil but the bride herself. The 
canonical bridal dress is of white satin or bro- 
cade., long train, bridal veil of tulle or real lace. 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 135 

and crange-blossoms, which none but a bride can 
wear. 

But this is varied now and then. Brides arc 
sometimes married in a traveling dress and 
bonnet. Young widows who marry a second 
time must not wear white nor veils ; and young 
ladies who marry widowers often dress in col- 
ored silks, and with a bonnet, or not, as they 
please. 

The fact, however, that at a day wedding the 
bride is properly in low evening dress, and in all- 
the paraphernalia of full dress, wMle her husband 
is decidedly in morning costume, is one of those 
English anachronisms for which the French laugh 
at the Anglo-Saxons. 

However, it is etiquette and must be done. 

The cards are generally in this form — 

Mr. and Mrs. Smith 

request the pleasure of your company 

at the marriage of their daughter, 

Antoinette 

to 

Mr. Lewis Mortimer, 

On Wednesday, March 20th, at 3 o'clock, 

at 

Grace Chursh. 



126 THE AMERICAN CODE OP MASNElvS. 

Another card bears the following inscription- 
Reception. 
174 E. Kent street, 
at half -past three o'clock, 

The cards admitting people to the church are 
almost needless, for everybody goes to a church 
until it is full, and then nobody can get in if they 
possess a card. 

After these cards are out. the fiancee, or com- 
ing bride, must not appear in public. This is 
an absurd regulation, but one on which so- 
ciety is entirely decided, and very stringent. 
In asking a young lady to be her brides- 
maid, the bride is generally actuated by 
feelings of relationship or friendship, although 
fashion and wealth often influence these 
invitations. Each bridesmaid is expected to 
give a handsome present. The groom asks 
men of his own age, and of his intimate ac- 
quaintance. They must be unmarried men, of 
course, and arrange all matters at the church. 
Music should play softly through the preparatory 
ceremony of the entrance of the family, Th3 
mother of the bride, her brothers and sisters. 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 12? 

should precede her to the church and be seated in 
pews before she enters, unless the mother is a 
widow and gives away the bride herself— a very 
touching and beautiful ceremony. As the bride 
walks up the aisle the organ should play a wed- 
ding march. 

After the ceremony, which should be conducted 
with great dignity and composure on ali hands, 
for exhibitions of feeling, in public, are in the 
worst possible taste, the officiating clergyman 
shakes hands with the young couple, and con- 
gratulates them. The bride takes her husband's 
right arm, and they walk down the broad aisle, 
without recognizing acquaintances in the church, 
to their carriage at the door (here a maid should 
be in waiting with a cloak to wrap the bride from 
draughts and from intrusive starers); they then 
drive home alone, or to the house where the re- 
ception is to be held. 

The bride and groom stand together under a 
floral design (a bell, generally), and with the 
bridesmaids at the right of the bride. 

The ushers take up the people to be presented, 
and introduce each by name. 

The bride's mother yields her place as hostess 



J £8 TKE AMERICAN CODE CF MANNERS. 

for the nonce, and is either not especially in any 
one spot receiving, or, if she is, is always ad- 
dressed after the bride. 

The rest of the family make themselves gen- 
erally agreeable to the guests at the reception, but 
every honor is conceded to the bride. 

Two hours is the longest time which etiquette 
requires of the newly-married pair in their busi- 
ness of receiving. 

The bride retires changes her white dress for a 
traveling suit, generally of gray cloth or of some 
quiet-colored silk, but never black, and in her 
bonnet or hat comes down with her mother and 
sisters and friends, and meets the groom, who 
has also changed his dress for a traveling suit, 
when occurs a scene of mingled tears and smiles. 
The horses and driver and groom of the carriage 
which is to bear off the happy pair for the honey- 
moon are all dressed with white favors and flow- 
ers, and as they drive off rice is thrown after 
them, and a shower of old slippers. Happy will 
they be forever after if one slipper alights on the 
carriage. So says the old Welsh tradition. 

The most approved fashion now decides that 
the happy pair go to some friend's house, at 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 129 

which they spend the honeymoon. Some gene- 
rous person who can retire and leave house and 
servants to them is a great boon to a newly- 
married pair. However, in this land of comforta- 
ble hotels, an agreeable and quiet apartment in 
any of our great cities can easily be procured. 

After returning to the city, the bride generally 
advises her friends by cards of her being ready 
to receive them on certain days. If not, the 
friends should call within a month after her re- 
turn, to leave their cards of congratulation. 

Dinners and lunches and parties in honor of 
the young pair should follow in quick succession. 

If a wedding occurs in the evening, the groom 
should appear in evening dress, of course, as 
all gentlemen must do after nightfall. A white 
cravat with a frock coat is a dreadful solecism, 
only permitted to- the clergy. It is now worn, 
however, in summer, for cleanliness, sometimes, 
but should then be made of duck, or Marseilles — 
not of cambric. 

A widow, on marrying again, should not use 
her la '„q husband's name or initials, but in this 
wise : If she was Angela Jones, and had married 
Mr. Brown, and, being his widow, wishes to 



130 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

marry Mr. Thompson, her card should read 

thus — 

Mr. and Mrs. Jones 

request the pleasure of your company at the 

marriage of their daughter, 

Angela Jones Brown, 

to 

William Thompson, Esq., 

On Thursday, March 10th, 

etc., etc., etc. 

Or, better still, she requests a friend to give he* 
a reception, and the friend's name appears on an 

"At Home," 

with the cards of the widow and of the gentleman 
whom she intends to marry simply included in 
the envelope. 

Calls of sympathy should "be made in person a 
week after the death of a member of a family 
whom you wish to treat with exceeding respect and 
kindness. Of course you do not ask to see the 
afflicted widow or daughters, but you personally 
inquire for them. You can leave a plain card 
with your name, or pencil a few words upon it. 
It is always well, also, to write a note expressive 
of your sympathy. 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 131 

If neither can be done, send a card by a ser- 
vant ; but a personal visit is always appre- 
ciated. We are not careful enough in this 
Country of these points of etiquette. We 
should call to inquire for the sick, to send 
inessages of kind inquiry, to show our pleasure 
in our friends' good fortune and to sympathize 
With them in trouble 



132 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 



AMERICAN MISTAKES. 

AMERICAN women feel very angry at An- 
thony Trollope and at Miss de la Ramee 
("Ouida"), and at other writers, for their 
sketches of the American girl in Europe. 

And, indeed, these pictures seem to us, who see 
the best American girls and see them at home, 
to be very coarse daubs of a very beautiful 
original. We have no sympathy with Sardou's 
" Uncle Sam/' which is a sketch of American 
life utterly repellent to our civilized idea of the 
proprieties. 

And yet traveling in Europe we do see here 
and there some eccentric and careless persons 
who violate etiquette at every turn ; who are rich, 
uneducated, vulgar and loud, and we regret to 
learn that they are Americans. 

People in Europe take of course the very promi- 
nently eccentric as types of our nation. If people 
behave properly, they are supposed to be — not 
Americans, but English ; in fact, the well-bred 



THE AMERICAN CODli; OF MANNERS. 133 

create no ripple on the surface ; they arc only 

let alone. 

The peculiarity of our political system lias 

it 
much to do with this, as a Senator may be the 

most ill-bred of men ; a foreign Minister and his 
family may be, and often are, totally unacquainted 
with etiquette. Now, the young and beautiful 
American girl is also in a very anomalous posi- 
tion, looking from. European eyes. 

She has never been graded, as in England, by 
an iron rule. She has possibly never even heard 
of that pride of birth which keeps the remotest 
granddaughters of certain houses in order, even 
if they have a roaming and piratical turn. She 
knows nothing of that " mysterious something" 
called conventionality. She only knows that she 
has owned her bit of sea and sky, of hillside or 
rpland lawn, her prospect and her retrospect ever 
smce she was born. There has been nothing be- 
tween her and the thing she wanted since she 
learned to walk. To steadily approach the tree 
and to gather the peach has been her manifest- 
destiny. 

If she has been bred in the country and has 
come to New York or Boston to do her shopping, 



134 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

she has gone to the best shops and has bought the 
latest fashion ; so when she goes to Europe she 
intends to take the best she can get — kings and 
queens, and dukes and princes, being the best, 
she steps up and takes them ! So with art and 
science, and the joys of traveling. She is Sir 
Francis Drake, Paul Jones, Columbus. Audacity- 
is rewarded in her case by a thousand victories to 
one defeat. 

What seems in her at first sight like an extra- 
ordinary and courageous impudence, is simply 
ignorance of that cobweb wall of etiquette which 
the spiders of all ages have been spinning, but 
which she does not see. No one has told her 
about it. She is like the blind man who re- 
ceived his sight in middle age, walking up 
against solid wails and empty space alike. 
They are the same to him, and to her, un- 
til both painfully learn the difference ; but 
if she does not see other people and things, 
they see her. She is apt to be beautiful and she 
is sure to be strange ; so she is looked at, cata- 
logued, described. She gets into the pages of an 
English novel, and then is shocked (as we are all 
apt to be) at her own photograph. It is not com- 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 135 

plimcntary, but it is the image she has painted 
on the foreign camera. She is delineated by a 
native artist, perhaps, and bocomes furious at his 
want of patriotism. It may happen that he is 
her best friend, and is but showing her to herself 
as others see her. 

The late Mr. Motley — the most chivalrous of 
men — declared that some of the experiences of 
his own countrymen in Europe upset for him all 
his preconceived ideas. He had been bred in 
that cultivated and conventional smaller circle 
of American society whose members behave like- 
conventional people all over the world; but as 
Minister at two foreign courts he was destined to 
see the far more extensive type of his country- 
women. It was an anecdote which he was fond of 
telling, that a young lady wrote to him at one of 
the two courts which he represented, demanding 
of him that she should be taken into the best 
society, and adding that she did not ask it as a 
favor, but that she demanded it as a right. He 
asked her if she had a chaperon. She said no, 
but if that were necessary he must furnish one ; 
adding that, in her opinion, "that was what 
Ministers were sent to Europe for," 



136 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

Her beauty and wealth, and her perfect gentle- ■ 
ness and innocence in all this demand, made her 
a conspicuous and a valuable specimen. She 
drove through Europe in a coach-and-four, so to 
speak, disdaining advice, and feeling insulted at 
any suggestion that she was outraging conve- 
nances, never reading insult in men's eyes, nor 
suspecting evil. Having been taken all over 
Europe for a Tartar princess, a Russian grand 
duchess, an actress, a dancer, anything but what 
she was, she came calmly home, married the 
man of her choice, settled down in Indiana or 
Connecticut, whence her daughter, when her 
time comes, will go off on a similar jaunt. 

Still, one may say that American women, do 
what they will, cannot be more original or more 
lawless, than are English women ; therefore, why 
is she more observed ? This is a great mistake. 
An English woman is ticketed. She is somebody ! 
The Kickleburys on the Rhine were as curious 
specimens to Lady Frances as is Daisy Miller to 
the well-bred old lady with the gray curls ; but 
Lady Frances knows her rank, and their want of 
it, while the two Americans are, to all intents and 
purposes, of the same social rank. Or, even more 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 137 

con fusing, it is possible that Daisy Miller may be 
the daughter of an ambassador or a senator, and 
the conventional lady may be Mrs. Smith, of 
Smithville, and a nobody in European estimation. 
They do not understand our political equality. 

After leaving the gentle and ignorant women 
who are innocently shocking Europe, and who 
are being written up, almost ad nauseam, we come 
to the larger class, who know better, and who are 
either foolishly regardless of appearances, or who 
are desirous of attracting attention. It is curious 
that, amidst the adventuresses of all nations, the 
American adventuress has so decided an origi- 
nality. One would think that the type would be 
somewhat monotonous ; but is there a city, a 
watering place, a sea coast, a mountain pass in 
Europe where some American woman is not seek- 
ing notoriety, and is not doing it with a marked 
nationality. 

" Ouida," in her bad and foolish novels, hits off 
occasionally this peculiar type. Her sketch of 
Mrs. Henry V. Clams, in the novel of " Friend- 
ship," is a striking portrait ; and Anthony Trol- 
lope has made some good but rather blundering 
masculine attempts. 



138 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

No wonder that the next innocent and ignorant 
person who comes along mistakes Daisy Miller 
for Mrs. Henry V. Clams, for externally their 
lives are very much alike. Wild, disobedient, 
foolish daughters of careless, indifferent, ignorant 
mothers, they have not learned even to appear to 
be respectful. The European girl has at least 
learned that. 

In the city of New York an intelligent foreigner 
remarked that he could understand everything 
better than the relation of daughter to mother. 
In every other country it carried reverence, and a 
certain simulated obedience, if not the real thing. 
Here he saw in many most respectable families 
daughters who did not even pretend to respect or 
obey their mothers. It is an American disability, 
the habit of respect, and undoubtedly shocks 
foreigners, as it should shock natives ; but it is 
perhaps inevitable in a republic ; perhaps we 
have thrown away too much. The mother who 
has reverenced nothing herself is not apt to bring 
up her daughters to reverence her. Whatever 
may be the reason, the fact remains, and to this 
may be referred some foreign misapprehensions. 
There are very many well-meaning American 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 130 

daughters who do not treat their mothers with 
proper reverence of manner. 

Tt is not worth a strong defense — that life of 
people who live in any country but their own. 
That idle, purposeless, scandal-loving, rootless 
impersonal thing, known all over Europe as the 
"American Colony," is not worth the powder 
by which it might be blown up. The most pam 
pered alien misses so much in living abroad tnat 
it is useless to attack her. What woman can 
enter church, charities, society, or build her 
hearthstone firmly in any land into which she 
has sunk no roots ? It is a woman's duty to 
follow her husband, but yet what misery has 
come of these mixed marriages, from which 
ambitious mothers have hoped so much, and 
for which foolish fathers have paid so much ? 

Marriage is a very different thing to the Euro- 
pean from that definite and respectable duty 
Which it represents to the American mind. It is 
there an arrangement ; it includes no necessity of 
constancy ; the husband loses no social esteem 
if he leads a life of recognized and open infidel- 
ity. His wife is supposed to have been more 
than paid for her money, her sacrifices and the 



140 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

insults which she endures, if, oy the gift of 
his title, he has introduced her to the Faubourg 
or to the Prince of Wales ! 

The story is as old as human folly, and will 
continue until folly shall die, that hundreds of 
American parents are ready and anxious to-day 
to risk the happiness of their beautiful daugh- 
ters, and to put their own necks under a finan- 
cial yoke, to buy a title for them. No doubt, to 
the poor girl, there has been real illusion here. 
The foreigner has much that is fascinating in 
mind and manner ; he treats his jiancde well, how- 
ever he may treat his wife, and to her romantic, 
inexperienced heart, what more fascinating 
chimera — one in which wiser heads than hers 
have indulged — of that possible probability 
that in old renown there is promise of present 
virtue — that a Clifford or a Howard or a Conde is 
made of better blood than Jones and Brown, 
and that a house which has been built for three 
centuries is better worth living in than one which 
was knocked up by contract last month. It is 
not until she has experienced the humilia- 
tions reserved for every hour of her life that 
she finds she has lost her American nobility 



TliE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 141 

and rank, and has received dead sea apples in 
exchange. 

To a woman who is frivolous and made up of 
vulgar vanity there may he gratification in see- 
ing other Americans stare as her name and title 
are called out at the door of an opera or a 
Queen's drawing-room. That may repay her for 
hours of abandonment, insult and a position 
where she is always on sufferance ; hut to those 
who, with fresh hearts and with the honest in- 
experienced hope of young womanhood, have en- 
tered into these marriages, dreaming of happi- 
ness, how many realize their dreams? How 
rarely does the young American wife in Europe 
look happy ? She has not love, honor, obedience, 
troops of friends. She is separated from her own 
family ; those who would love her and keep her 
in sickness and in health are not by her side. 
She is away from that land which recognizes her 
as one who has no superiors. If she has not re- 
ceived positive insult, unmitigated wrong, and 
determined cruelty, she believes herself happy. 
But she has been patronized ! 

To the honor of these American wives of noble 
and titled husbands be it said, as a rule, they 



142 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

have behaved well — they have not revenged 
themselves. The American women who have 
played most conspicuously the role of Bohemierine 
in Europe, and who have made the name of 
American wife a scandal and a reproach, have 
been, unfortunately, most frequently the wives of 
plain American citizens. 

"Is there anything peculiar in your relation- 
ship ?" asked an impertinent Guardsman of an 
American lady. " You are the first American 
woman whom I have ever seen traveling with her 
husband." 

But we may except two or three classes of 
foreigners who make good husbands : men who 
have a definite place in diplomacy, or in Gov- 
ernment, or the army or navy ; men who have 
something to do. Whether it is from their educa- 
tion, or from the firm anchorage of work, these 
men do make better husbands than do the idle pos- 
sessors of title, who consider it a disgraceful ne- 
cessity to marry an American heiress. And, again, 
there may be good lords and decent princes. They 
are not all bad ; but if one of these marries an 
American wife, and if he loves her and treats her 
well, ten to one his mother does not spare her. 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS 143 

The wife has no ancestral importance ; she does 
not date back to the Conquest ; unlike Don Caesar 
dc Bazan, she cannot, in rags, " wear her hat in the 
presence of royalty. ' ' She must be very handsome 
and well dressed "in the presence of royalty," 
and then, alas ! perhaps royalty takes too much 
notice. 

We cannot immediately educate the daughters 
of people who have suddenly stepped into the 
responsibilities of crude and unmanageable pros 
perity in the etiquette of the quiet, elegant, edu- 
cated, thoughtful people who have for a century 
or more pursued the even tenor of an American 
aristocracy. The two classes are living side by 
side, and until lately one class was quite oblivious 
of the other. A Daisy Miller is an unheard of, 
unknown, rather doubtful monster to a calm gen- 
tleman who lias only known the polished women 
of his own clearly-defined set. He does not be- 
lieve in her. But let him travel through the en- 
virons of our great cities, shake off his own asso- 
ciations ; let him go to the very pension where she 
talked to her courier, and he will find her. She is 
a republican outcrop, inevitable, but sure, and — 
sure to be misunderstood in Europe. 



M4 THE AMERICAN COl>E OF MANNERS. 

It seems sometimes quite impossible that an 
American woman, with the dowry of quick intel- 
ligence and imitative faculty which has made 
her so clever an artist, so skillful a musician, 
so honorable in her desire for education, and so 
well dressed and so well mannered, as she almost 
immediately becomes after contact with the 
world, should remain so oblivious of the evident 
proprieties which she shocks, and which no well- 
intentioned woman wishes to shock. Yet here is 
where she fails. The very absence of reverence for 
her mother, of which she is not perhaps fully aware, 
which dates back to her nursery, makes her im- 
patient of advice and angry at the implied dis- 
belief in her own knowledge. An American girl 
in Europe does not like to be told that she must 
not treat her courier with familiarity. She does 
not like to be told that she appears badly on the 
Pineian Hill. She would rather appear badly 
than to be told of it. The great moral purity of 
these American girls, the honor in which women 
are held in America, the utter want of morbidity 
in the relations between men and women, has, 
from its very rareness and impossibility to a for- 
eign mind, done very much to help alone: the 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 145 

mistake. In illustrating this phase of his fair 
countrywomen, Mr. Henry James, jr., cannot 
be too highly praised. His beautiful story of 
1 ' Madame de Mauves ' ' should never be forgot- 
ten. He knows how good they are, and he has 
said so. 

Of American snobbery, of the bowing down to 
a lord — who has not seen and regretted it ? That 
is a phase of our republican education which we 
would fain ignore. But there are few diseases 
cured without a severe, heroic remedy, and after 
a thorough diagnosis. We may as well accuse 
ourselves of our own national sins, and take the 
bitter pill at once. We are in the position of 
soldiers who will not obey the word of command. 
If Americans do behave in either a savage or a 
snobbish or an ignorant way in Europe, it is well 
that they should confess it to themselves, or 
else to bear the sarcasms patiently which are 
showered down on them by English authors. 
They can escape all by a slight attention to the 
laws of a recognized etiquette, nor need they 
lose one particle of self-respect by so doing. 



.46 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 



CHAPTER XL 

SOCIAL OBSERVANCES TOWARD FOREIGNERS AND 
TOWARD OUR OWN GREAT PEOPLE. 

THE way to treat a great man or woman who 
visits you is to do the best thing you 
can in your own way. A slavish imitation of 
the manners of one particular country, whose laws 
and whose rank is different from ours, would be 
absurd, and would deprive every nation of its 
individuality and of all interest, if carried too 
far. 

For instance, it would be absurd for us to at- 
tempt to treat Prince Leopold with the thousand 
courtesies which would only be understood and 
properly carried out by the Norroy King-at-Arms. 
We should receive him with' great respect— we owe 
that to ourselves — but in a truly American man- 
ner, as we would one of our own distinguished 
men, with the added interest and hospitality 
which we owe to every stranger. The running 
after such a person, the staring at him as if he 
were made ci different clav is absurd, weak and 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 147 

ridiculous. It is essentially rude, too ; it is a 
coarse and- a vulgar thing to follow a royal prince, 
to let him for one moment consider himself a 
target for the gossiping observation of a thought- 
less crowd. 

Eespect and good feeling being the background 
of manners, people with those two qualities 
need hardly be told how to behave under any 
circumstances. It may be well, however, to ob- 
serve one or two little details. 

English people, especially princes, do not ex- 
pect to be shaken hands with ; that is an Ameri- 
can custom. The French princes who came over 
to fight under McCleilan — the Comte de Paris 
and Due de Chartres — cultivated this pleasant 
habit, and made themselves very popular ; but 
the old Prince de Joinville, their uncle, who 
came with them, and who was a sailor and the 
most democratic of princes, never could bring 
himself to do it indiscriminately. He had been 
too near the Old World etiquette, disturbed as it 
had been, even in his day. It is well for Ameri- 
cans to remember this, a,nd to content themselves 
with a low bow. 

After the ceremony of presentation, if the royal 



148 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

visitor, or any other visitor, honors our private 
houses with his presence, we should simply see 
that he is taken in first to supper or to dinner; 
that little concession to Old World etiquette is 
only decent, because anything less would look 
like an insult ; but, after that, we need not trou- 
ble ourselves to be especially particular ; in fact, 
we must avoid being fussy, which is the worst ex- 
cess of amiability. 

As for our own great people — a president, for 
instance — we should treat him with more honor 
than we do — v 3ry much more. 

In inviting him to our houses we should be 
careful to see that he and his wife are conducted 
first to the refreshment table. No one should, 
either from carelessness or indifference, begin to 
eat at a reception given to the President before 
he has been helped. This w T e ow T e to the common 
decencies of life. 

On the arrival of the President and suite at a 
small town in the interior, the business of receiv- 
ing him properly is often laughingly discussed 
by the inhabitants. The proper etiquette would 
be for a delegation of the first citizens to meet 
him at the train and to conduct him in one of 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 149 

their own private carriages to the house where he is 
to stop, unless public ceremonies should interfere. 
And then he should he first privately consulted 
as to his own desire for rest and refreshment 
before he is compelled to receive the good people 
who wish to see him. If he consents to a recep- 
tion, let one be given to him, of course ; and each 
person who enters should be presented to him 
first by host and hostess, but there should always 
be a thought for the private rest and refreshment 
to an over-fatigued man. 

It is always an agreeable thing for a great man, 
a traveled man, a much shaken-handed man. to 
be taken to some luxurious, quiet, private house, 
where an amiable and accomplished hostess 
knows how to treat him with dignified courtesy, 
and to be let alone occasionally ; for the hour 
of rest and the "not being obliged to talk" are 
boons highly prized by the public man. 

To appear in the front rank, to follow up a 
great man, to be the star which shines with re- 
flected lustre, these are the attributes of the snob 
and the bore ; and scarcely ever do we see a public 
reception to a distinguished luminary that the 
lesser satellite is not present also. There are men 



150 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

who have no sense of delicacy on this point — 
women who make themselves into notorieties as 
lion-hunters, and as the most disagreeable of 
bores, because they cannot be put down as men 
can. Their sex, unfortunately, protects them ; 
but if they could hear the whispered criticism, they 
would gladly reform their too-officious manners. 
A capital article could be written on this subject 
alone , indeed, as referring to a whole class of 
such, a recent English paper says : " People often 
imagine that if they could only get the entree into 
some envied clique, their position and happiness 
would be assured for life. At last the much-de- 
sired opportunity presents itself, and they enter 
the celestial portals. Their surroundings, when they 
find themselves there, may possibly surpass their 
fondest wishes, but, as regards themselves, all is 
not satisf a ctory ; on the contrary, they are con- 
scious of a complete, indescribable failure. They 
are painfully conscious that they have nothing in 
common with the inhabitants of their longed-for 
Paradise, and these exalted beings give them clearly 
to understand that they look upon them as flies in 
their ointment. To have the cup of happiness 
snatched from one's grasp just as one is putting 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 151 

it to the lips is mortifying, and the sense of 
disappointment to one's fondest hopes is even 
worse. In these days ' society ' is the most run 
after of all the 'will-o'-the-wisps,' and there 
are many thousands of people whose highest 
desire is to be on a familiar footing with some 
coterie, which especially commends itself to their 
tastes. They are ever on the watch for an oppor- 
tunity for inserting the thin end of the wedge 
into the desired set. There is great diversity 
of opinion as to what is the most delectable 
of earthly circles, but one or two descriptions 
taken at random will easily exemplify the 
common experience of searchers after social 
perfection. ' ' 

The snob must have anything but an agreeable 
experience in thus trying to get in where he is 
not wanted. He is ever the marplot of these 
public attentions to distinguished people, and is 
to be particularly dreaded. 

If a family wish to entertain a president or a 
prince, they should be careful, in issuing cards, 
that their invitation is explicit and in good 
grammar. Many invitations read absurdly, as 
this sort of thin«r : 



152 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS, 

u Mrs. Brown at home, July 1st. to meet Presi- 
dent Hayes." 

Mrs. Brown thinks that she has invited you to 
meet President Hayes, whereas she has only re- 
corded a truism. She should have said : 

Mrs. Brown 

requests the pleasure of the company of 

Mr. and Mrs. Smith, 

on Friday evening, July 1st, 

to meet 

The President 

and 
Mrs. Hayes. 

Or it is proper, in giving a large entertainment, 
to have the card printed thus : 

Mr. and Mrs. Brown request the pleasure of 
your company at luncheon, on Tuesday, March 
2d, to meet 

The President 

and 

Mrs. Hayes. 

1 o'clock. 18 E. Kent street. 

Many sticklers for the old-fashioned and most 
respectful etiquette, however, object to this use 
of the words " your company," and say " whose 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. ' 153 

company?" They take the trouble to insert the 
name always, but that becomes so well under- 
stood through the address on the outside of the 
envelope, and the trouble is so enormous, that in 
our republican code of manners we may insist 
that the latter printed form is sufficiently cere- 
monious. 

Some question arises in country neighborhoods, 
where there are no Delmonico cooks, as to 
whether a hot lunch or a cold one is the most 
in order. We say a cold lunch, as being more 
convenient and always sure to be better ; such 
dishes as chicken salad, cold ham and pressed 
meats, ice cream, Charlotte Russe and blanc- 
mange, jelly and cake, being easily prepared 
before, and all within fne power of every good 
housekeeper; while, if you have not a French 
cook, hot dishes, like sweetbread and peas, 
croquettes and terrapin, iilet de bceuf and game 
pies, are apt to be very poor, particularly if the 
lunch is delayed. It should be the business of 
every country housekeeper to study up egg salads, 
lobster and chicken salads, the common salads 
from the garden, and all the preparations of 
potted meats, which are excellent, such as 



154 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

Melton veal and chicken, cold, with a vegetable 
salad, all of which come in well at a hastily im- 
provised lunch. A potato salad can be made to 
be perfectly delicious and very ornamental. 

Morning entertainments have become very 
fashionable in these later years, but they have 
not, of course, obliterated the ball, the evening 
party and the evening wedding. It is to be hoped 
that they never will, for gentlemen find it difficult 
to be present at these day parties. Our work-a-day 
country, thank Heaven, finds something for every 
man to do, in the daytime ; it is only occasionally 
that a man can come up town before dinner. 
Therefore, hostesses should accept the added 
trouble, and give their entertainments in the 
evening, if possible. There has been too much 
shirking of this sort of responsibility in favor of 
the more easily gotten up tea at five o'clock — a 
very much overdone form of entertainment. 

While it is always proper to give a foreigner his 
title, as it is respectful to call a person by his real 
name instead of being sure to call Mr. Cromwell 
Mr. Carroll, or Mr. Cheeseborough Mr. Chees- 
man, or Mrs. Sherman Mrs. Sherwin, as some 
people always do. yet it is not very easy to find out 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 155 

how to address a prince, a duke, or an archbishop 
simply by looking into any English book of eti- 
quette. In England they avoid using the title as 
much as possible wnen talking with a very exalted 
person. We, as republicans, are not expected 
to know all the details, and if our manners are 
agreeable and polite, and not too excruciatingly 
respectful, we shall be forgiven for little lapses 
of the unintentional kind. 

A too great familiarity and appearance of inti- 
macy should be avoided with such a person. How- 
ever courteous an English duke may appear, he 
really resents any attempt at familiarity. Never 
slap a foreigner on the back, or touch his elbow, 
as is common enough between young American 
men. It is considered abroad the highest insult 
to touch the person. A young midshipman 
going abroad for his first cruise treated a party 
of princes and noblemen who came on board his 
ship at some port in the Mediterranean as he 
had been in the habit of treating his own fellow- 
cadets, and he was challenged to five duels the 
next day. It took the whole force of the Ameri- 
can navy to get him out of this particular scrape. 
It would not injure our own manners if a little of 



156 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

this respect for the dignity of the body were 
more observed. 

AYoinen going abroad should be very careful 
not to assume the insignia of rank. American 
women have been known to go into foreign 
society wearing coronets, which is absurd. A 
lady once wore the Prince of Wales' plume in her 
hair, and was requested to not do so again. The 
fondness which American women have shown for 
title and gilded equipage of rank has caused 
them to be laughed at abroad and at home, 
and they tell of one ecstatic young lady, who 
said that she " loved to breathe an air which 
was thick with archdukes and princes." These 
women are the toadstools — even worse than 
mushrooms — of our best society. They are the 
exceptions, and not the rule. 

In receiving and entertaining distinguished 
foreigners, try to find out first if they are genuine. 
We are often captured by a bogus lord or a 
fictitious count. Try to be always on guard. 
Remember one fact, that the best-born men are 
not fond of parading a title. General Grant did 
not go over Europe saying " Here am I ! the 
soldier of the world ; the man, who, after Wei- 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 157 

lington, has the highest military renown ; the 
President, twice, of the United States !" No ; 
those who wanted to see General Grant had to 
go and find a modest little man, smoking in some 
back parlor. 

So of real lords and real dukes, and great 
men of Continental hereditary title — they are 
generally silent, quiet men, anxious to "be let 
alone. Occasionally an exceedingly jolly and 
agreeable man, like the Earl of Dufferin, appears, 
and is as entertaining as if he had no greatness 
to carry around. Lord Houghton w T as also sin- 
gularly gracious, convivial, and fond of seeing 
everybody. The Dean of Westminster was 
frightened and shocked at being so followed in 
America, and asked if people were not mistaken 
as to his real position, not knowing that, in his 
case, we loved his truly excellent and liberal 
breadth of character. 

We, perhaps, effuse too much, and in the 
wrong place. Let us study dignity and quiet 
repose of manner. As a nation we need it. 



158 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 



CHAPTER XII. 

YOUNG PEOPLE AT A WATERING PLACE. 

f~¥ "MiE conduct of young American women at a 
JL watering place has been the prominent and 
eloquent text of the English traveler, from the 
days of Mrs. Trollope down to Sala. Indeed, 
the more sober-minded of our own people have 
not been silent on the subject. The beautiful 
young women who desire to be seen, and who 
mistake notoriety for fame, are pleased with the 
sensation they create, and after them comes, 
laboriously, the rather passe'e, fast, married woman, 
who is nursing her rapidly decaying powers, and 
who believes that if she is noisy and vulgar and 
flirtatious, she will be especially commended as 
a belle. 

To go out into the surf in one of those very 
decollete and sleeveless bathing dresses, which are 
worn at D'Ouville and Trouville (and mentioned 
by the not too scrupulous Ouida with abhor- 
rence) ; to be loudly commended by a set of fast 
men for some outrage upon the sober order of 



the beach ; to dress in a conspicuous manner at 
breakfast ; to lounge about on the piazza at New 
London, Long Branch, Saratoga or Richfield 
in a negligee only suited to one's bedroom ; to 
drive three ponies abreast ; to be loud, defiant and 
brazen — has been the plan of too many Ameri- 
can women in the great publicity of a watering 
place, even by the mothers of families, as well as 
by their coarse, unsexed daughters. This has 
been the custom altogether too frequently for the 
good name of American women. Flirtation goes 
on conspicuously at these places, and the reporter 
of a newspaper is blamed, if, in giving the news 
of the day, he tells what he sees. 

The wholesale violation of good manners and 
of etiquette is shocking, and it has led to uni- 
versal misapprehension on the part of observ- 
ing foreigners as to the morals of American 
women. No oth^r people like to live in public 
as we do ; no other people except the demi monde 
of Europe and their foolish imitators fiirt, dance, 
swim, eat, drink, amuse themselves so unrestrain- 
edly before any number of very careless critics. 
We are gregarious ; we like to spend the summer 
in a great crowd — to eat, to drink, to listen to 



180 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNEKS. 

music, to drive and to bathe with our dear five 
thousand friends. But we should, in so doing, re- 
member that the greater the crowd, the more- 
should each individual be "on guard," and the 
more should each person envelop himself, or her- 
self, in a wrapping of personal dignity. 

The appearance of a handsome young married 
woman at a fashionable watering place— one at- 
tended by a large crowd of adorers, a woman 
who may have a husband who is well-known 
politically and financially — is always a fact 
patent to the whole world, reported by 
the newspapers, and commented upon by the 
thousand who go and come at a watering 
place. To conduct herself so that even the 
breath of slander shall not be attached to her 
name is the study of an honorable lady. She 
dresses quietly; she thinks of little things ; she is 
courteous ; she does not stay out late at her 
yachting parties ; she is not seen too much with 
one gentleman. If she be the wife of a public 
official, she should not give any one the power to 
say that she is spending the public money. No 
suspicion of bribery or corruption should attach 
itself to her. 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNEKS. 161 

And as for young people, mere should be no 
picnic, no yachting parties without a chaperon ; 
no staying out late in the evening ; no driving off 
on a coach without some "mamma" to quell the 
overflow of rising merriment. Young ladies have 
no idea of the group of moody, jaundiced men of 
the world who sit at the smoking end of the piazza 
and say dreadful things of women. Of course 
these critics cannot be commended, but they 
should be disarmed by the propriety of the women. 

Many an innocent girl has been slandered who 
did not deserve the harsh criticism ; but if 
she would remember what she did, and how she 
looked, and what company she kept at a watering 
place, perhaps she would be very sorry that she 
had innocently helped along the slander. 

There is always enough that is reprehensible 
going on. Some disingenuous girl is deceiving 
her mother, flirting with some forbidden beau -, 
some arrant coquette is carrying on her game ; 
some married flirt is occupied with her robust 
determination to be talked about ; some Mrs. 
Skew ton is painting her eyebrows and trying to 
pass for a young beauty; some interloper into the 
ranks of respectability is carrying on her dan- 



1(53 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

gerous game : all these are the companions, daily 
and hourly, of the innocent, respectable and un- 
suspecting ladies at a watering place. 

Is it not all an argument for the preservation 
of quiet, dignified and proper manners ? Who 
wishes to "be taken for what she is not ? We all 
want our rank, the advantage of good morals, 
good antecedents and a good reputation in every 
respect. Shall we then throw it away for a mo- 
ment's trivial laughter ? 

The habits of a watering place in America vary, 
of course, with the situation. A lone hotel, 
which brings people into very close juxtapo- 
sition, is the very hot-bed of gossip. The 
idlers have nothing to do but to talk of 
the busy ones. Each young couple is watched 
as they wander off for a stroll on the beach, a 
sail at twilight, a drive or a swim. At the great, 
crowded sea-side places, like Coney Island and 
Long Branch, there is less gossip, unless some 
woman makes herself very prominent. It is 
amazing to see how much less men exploit their 
contempt of appearances at a watering place 
than women do. It would seem as if some wo- 
men lost their senses when they got into a crowd. 



THE AMERICAN CODS OF MANNERS. 153 

The intimacies and flirtations between young 
unmarried girls and young married men, which 
have unfortunately "become so fashionable and so 
very much observed at watering places lately, 
are much to be deprecated. The sorrow and 
shame which has resulted from these very im- 
proper intimacies, but which society winks at, 
have been enormous. Families become hopelessly 
estranged, and, of all the sufferers, the innocent 
girl is the most to be pitied. She has not known 
at all " what the world will say." 

Of the flirtations of married flirts with young 
men, the world is full. But although this custom 
lowers the tone of society, no one is to be pitied, 
for the husband should have courage enough to 
rule his wife and to prevent his own disgrace. 
The man who suffers his wife to be talked about 
deserves ail the shame that he gets. The woman 
who flirts is old enough to know better : no one 
cares very much what becomes of her; and, as for 
the young man, he accepts with his eyes open the 
danger and the disgrace of the wmole position. 
So, while it is one of the most crying evils of our 
republican society, there is very little to be said 
about it, except to warn mothers not to let their 



164 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANN3BS. 

daughters have anything to do with a young 
married flirt at a watering place or elsewhere. 
There is no burden on earth like that of a flir- 
tatious woman tied to an honest man. 

A very competent critic, speaking of our young 
people, justly says : 

"The evils arising from the excessive liberty 
permitted to American youth cannot be cured by 
laws. If we are ever to root it out, we must 
begin at the very bottom. Family life must be 
reformed. For children, parental authority is the 
only sure guide. Coleridge well said that he who 
was not able to govern himself must be governed 
by others, and experience has shown that the 
children of civilized parents are as little able to 
govern themselves as the children of savages. 
The liberty or license of our youth will have to be 
curtailed. As our society is becoming more com- 
plex and artificial, like older societies in Europe, 
our children will have to approximate to them in 
status, and parents will have to waken to a sense 
of their responsibilities, and subordinate their 
ambitions and their pleasures to their duties." 

Mothers should mingle more in the pleasures 
it their daughters. If young men kcew that 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 165 

ibey must invite the mother first to a din- 
ner, a drive or a picnic, before inviting the 
daughter, it would make the surest correc- 
tion of one of the evil manners of the day. 
He who has two oars to his boat is surer 
of winning' the race than he who has only one. 
A man who treats the parents of the young 
lady whom he likes with respect is apt to have 
their assistance in winning her. 

Too youthful marriages are to be deprecated. 
Men often regret deeply through life the mis- 
takes made in their green youth in the choice of 
a companion, whom Time has proved unworthy 
of them. Again, they look back upon those early 
love affairs, which were once of so much import- 
ance — those heartbreaks which once seemed so 
severe — and find that the sting of parting was a 
very healthy pain, and they are very glad they 
were saved from a marriage which would have 
been so very uncongenial. Indeed as a man 
surveys the choice of his youth, and finds her 
ignorant, frivolous, sordid and unworthy, he 
often blames his friends that they were not 
more severe, and did not keep him from such 
n marriase. 



168 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

A woman bows with more submission to her 
married fate, whatever it may have been. She is 
obliged to, and religion and duty both help her 
10 wear her yoke. But, sometimes, does she not 
wish that the foolish fancy and flirtation of a 
watering place had been thwarted ? and that she 
had been forced into a longer acquaintance, and 
a more deliberate period of reflection before she 
took that fatal step which can never be recalled. 

If young engaged couples go to a watering 
place, they should avoid any outer demonstrations 
of devotion. This is in the worst taste. The 
gentleman should strive to avoid exhibitions of 
jealousy if his fiancee chooses to dance with 
another man, and the lady should be equally cool 
over her lover's behavior. Many an engagement, 
however, has been broken off at a watering place, 
or after a summer at one. It is often a crucial 
test of constancy. 

It is quite proper at a watering place to speak 
without an introduction to those whom you meet 
every day. Gentlemen should always, raise their 
hats to their fair fellow-boarders, and the ac- 
quaintance of ladies on a hotel piazza can hurt 
no one. The day the party leaves the hotel, that 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 167 

day the acquaintance can cease if the people so 
choose. 

A young man must be careful not to be push- 
ing, and must, of course, be introduced to a party 
of ladies, or one young lady, before he could offer 
her any civilities or ask her to dance ; but for the 
elderly and the married there need be no such 
stiffness. Half of the pleasure of a watering- 
place life is the informal chat, the picking up of 
a new acquaintance, the insight into a larger life. 

As ior the cads, the pretenders, the adventur- 
es, the scamps, the demi-monde ladies, who try to 
|3t into good society, they always manage to 
get very well introduced and bring letters to 
some prominent lady, or are the guests at some 
dinner given by some social ainphytrion, They 
are, therefore, not kept out by any stiffness of 
manner, for they take care to be well introduced. 
It is only after the summer is over that such peo- 
ple are unmasked ; often they have been the 
patronized favorites of some very scrupulous 
lady. This great carelessness of giving letters, 
the audacity of adventurers and their success, 
are great troubles in our republican society. 
There seems to be no possibility of curing the 



168 TX1E AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

evil ; therefore all the greater necessity of a 
proud personal dignity. 

It is feared that there is not so much principle 
exhibited in giving letters to a man whose char^ 
acter is little known as there should be. Cer- 
tainly, many very reprehensible foreigners have 
arrived on these shores with most excellent letters 
and have turned out to be swindlers, forgers and 
sometimes even murderers. The success of cer- 
tain actresses and mock countesses will be well 
remembered by their victims, and such women 
choose the American watering place as their chief 
battle ground. The sudden disappearance of 
some such prominent favorite is often remem- 
bered and commented upon, and then the dupes 
find out whom they have been receiving. 

It seems strange that any careful parent can 
take «a family of daughters, year in and year out, 
to a watering place. The manners of such young 
ladies do not always compare well with those of 
the denizens of quiet country homes, nor do such 
young ladies marry as well, as a rule. They come 
to have the undesirable nameless reputation of 
'* college widows." Yet it is ft very difficult ques- 
tion to settle— - r where to go for the summer." 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 1£>D 

Country places are expensive, and very lonely. 
Young people desire society, and, alas ! so do 
their elders. Married ladies get tired of house- 
keeping, and like throe months of rest. The 
American watering-place hotels are the most 
splendid and comfortable in the world ; therefore 
the problem is easily solved by going to the most 
gay, the most amusing, the most brilliant watering 
place. If the young lady talks slang, and her 
mother is rather too easy in her manners, the stiff 
Englishman who sees them as he puts up for 
a day at Newport, Saratoga or Long Branch, 
goes away with the impression that all American 
women are rowdyish. But perhaps his specimens 
do not care ; so, except to the quiet and well- 
behaved, there is no harm done. 

Newport, as being at once ''home and watering 
place," is the least objectionable of all our sum- 
mer resorts. There etiquette reigns supreme. It 
is elegant, refined, exclusive. But it is not easy 
of access. It is the home of the very rich, but 
it is the queen of all watering places, in this 
country or Europe. 

"Call no society good until you have sounded 
its morals r c< we^l as its manners," 



170 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS, 



CHAPTER XIII, 



A HAUGHTY HOSTESS. 



M 



ANY a woman suddenly raised to rank 
^ JtJL and power in the Old World, as well as 
in the new, has thought that she was improved 
by her assumption of a mock dignity. There 
have been instances, too, in our Republic bf a 
supposed addition to one's importance in the 
disagreeable and atrocious display of bad man- 
ners toward the friends invited to one's house. 

It is not a rare thing in New York for a person 
to invite guests to her house for the purpose, it 
would seem, of insulting them. The manners of 
a hostess who has apparently made a party ir 
order that she may show to half her guests that 
she despised them are certainly not ornamental, 
but they are not altogether impossible. It used 
to be the distinguishing mark of certain old 
ladies — who, like small beer, had turned very sour 
with age — but it is also assumed now by some 
younger women, who imagine ,nat it gives them* 
a species of importance. 



'IHS AMERICAN CODE OF MANK2RR. 171 

Lady Holland in England, a woman whom no 
other woman would visit, assumed a very imperti- 
nent manner, perhaps to ward off insult. She 
would order Macaulay to stop talking, and tell 
Tom Moore that he was frivolous. She would 
command one man to carve, and another to move 
further down. The men bore it because they 
liked Lord Holland, who had been foolish enough 
to remove this amiable creature from another 
man's house. She was the wife of Sir Eichard 
Vassall. She had run away with Lord Holland. 

It is to be hoped that our haughty hostesses 
have no such evil memories behind them ; but 
there are instances in Boston, New York, Wash- 
ington, St. Louis and Cincinnati, and perhaps in 
other cities, of women who, having wealth, hand- 
some houses, and a desire to entertain, are still 
so bad-mannered and ill-tempered that they 
absolutely invite guests in order to insult them. 
One lady in one of these cities has a national 
reputation for bad manners, and people are 
afraid to go to her house lest she should be 
overtaken with a desire to be uncivil. It Is 
the extreme of bad manners. The Arab Knows 
better; the wild Indian is a gentleman in his 



172 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

clirty lodge ; the man who eats your salt is sacred, 
and if a woman is rude anywhere else, she aught 
to be most gracious at home. There is no such 
detestable use of one's privileges as to be rude on 
one's own ground. 

A hostess should think well before she invites 
people. She should be so generous as to let her 
friends alone ; unless she wishes to treat them well. 
Then, having made up her mind to invite them, 
she must remember that from that moment she 
is their slave. She is to be all attention and all 
suavity. If she has nothing to offer them but a 
small house and a cup of tea and a smile, she is 
just as much a hostess as if she were a queen. If 
she offers them every privilege, and is not cordial, 
she is a snob, a vulgarian and a poor greature. 

Not a thousand years ago a lady of New York, 
who, through her husband, enjoyed a very nigh 
social position, was led to invite — rather against 
her will — a lady who had but just entered the 
portals of good society. This lady came to re- 
ceive a cold bow at the door, and every possible 
insult of averted looks and neglect from the 
hostess. The conduct was so small, so mean 
and narrow, that a gentleman saw it and re* 



TEE AMEEICAIT CODE OF MANNERS. 173 

sented it. He was a leader in every sense, 
and he took occasion, before the evening was 
over, to say in the presence of his hostess 
that he thought a person who was invited to 
a house " to be ill-treated" merely, immediate- 
ly became very interesting. 

Mrs. Kouveau Eiche, who was sitting quite 
alone, began after this to experience a great 
improvement in her enjoyment. Her hostess, 
Mrs. Oldbones, became all attention. She 
took up gentlemen to introduce to Mrs. Nou- 
veau Biche, and haughty dames in brocade 
began to solicit the favor of a presentation. 

Mr. TVinkeye. who had produced this 
change, was very much amused, and he after- 
wards said to Mr. Oldbones, loud enough to 
be heard by everybody : 

"By the way, Oldbones, I give a dinner 
next week to Mrs. Nouveau Eiche. I have 
just one seat left ; hope you'll come." 

He was very careful not to invite Mrs. Old- 
bones, whose conduct was so unworthy of a 
lady, and who had outraged the first decency 
of good manners. 

A hostess should be very particular to specify 



iT4 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS 

her invitations whom she wishes to see, and no 
lady should go to a strange house unless she has 
received a card. A young gentleman may be 
taken, uninvited, by a married lady, because the 
married lady is all-powerful, and is supposed to 
indorse the respectability and the presentabiiity 
of the gentleman ; but a lady must always receive 
a card. 

If, however, through any misapprehensiou , 
some person gets into a house uninvited, a hostess 
should never show, by look or manner, that she 
observes it. The very fact that a person has 
crossed her threshold gives that person a claim 
upon the hostess. 

A few years ago a strange mistake was made. 
Two ladies of the same name gave an enter- 
tainment within a few doors of each other, 
Many persons got into the wrong house. 
The hostess who gained that day the admir- 
ing comments of all New York was the woman 
who received perfect strangers as if they 
were her best friends, and made them friends 
by that gracious reception. The other lady, less 
well bred, said to a gentleman who approached 
her: 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 175 

" I think you have got into the wrong house, 
haven't you?" 

" Yes," said he. " I thought this was a lady's 
house !" 

It was a terrible revenge, but a perfectly justifi- 
able one. 

In a rural university town there were two pro- 
fessors of the same name, and one of them asked 
a stranger gentleman to tea. He went to the 
house of the wrong professor, whose wife re- 
ceived him in a very chilling manner. The poor 
man bore it very courageously for awhile, but 
finally ventured to say : 

" Your husband invited me to tea." 

" Oh, no !" said this haughty hostess. " It must 
have been the other Professor S ; my hus- 
band never asks anybody to tea !" 

It occurred to this gentleman to say : "I should 
advise them not to accept if he did," but he 
merely bowed and departed. 

A hostess has so very charming a position, 
if she is amiable, that one wonders that even 
the temptations of power could lead her to 
be unamiable. She is in her hour of hostess- 
ship, perhaps, at the acme of a woman's ambi- 



176 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNEKS. 

tion. It is her place to make a number of 
people happy, to see that they are well fed, 
well introduced, and not too warm. She is the 
person of all others to whom every gentle, sweet 
emotion, and every grateful feeling turns. A 
hostess at a pretty country house is very much 
to he envied, as she can, without much effort, 
make everybody happy. A hostess in the city 
can become an enormous social power; if she 
has tact and a certain intelligence, she becomes 
the envied of men and the admired of women. 
That she should ever use this power to make 
herself disagreeable is most amazing. If we had 
not seen it done, we should hardly believe it 
possible. 

A hostess should never reprove her servants in 
the presence of her guests. All that worries her 
must be carefully concealed from them. It is her 
place to oil the wheels of the domestic machinery, 
so that nothing shall jar. It is quite impossible 
that in this country, where our servants are the 
worst in the world, they should ever be so 
trained that something may not go wrong. But 
the hostess must not appear to notice it. If she 
is disturbed, flustered and miserable, who can 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERH, 177 

enjoy anything ? There is no such utter mistake 
as to lose one's temper, one's nerve, ones com- 
posure, in company. Society may be a false 
condition of things, but, whatever its faults, it 
demands of a woman the very high virtues of 
self-command, gentleness and composure, polite 
ness, coolness and serenity. Good manners are 
said to be the shadows of virtues ; they are 
virtues. To be polite is a virtue of the highest. 

One of the greatest trials of a hostess is to find 
that her good dinner is kept waiting. It is a 
good plan to invite people for a half hour earlier 
than the dinner is really to be served, for that 
allows for the difference of watches and the well 
known want of punctuality of certain fashion 
able women. There is no greater compliment 
than this same punctuality ; it is the " courtesy of 
kings." Queen Victoria and the Prince of Wales 
never keep anybody waiting. 

But in our fashionable society there is a great 
want of punctuality. Those same women who 
dare to be haughty hostesses are always late at 
other people's dinners. It is the same audacity, 
impertinence, rudeness, which makes the hostess 
haughty that also makes her late. 



178 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

The amiable hostess bears the ruin of her fish 
and soup with equanimity. She smiles and bows 
as graciously when a late comer enters, buttoning 
her gloves, as when she sees Mrs. Earlybird enter. 
Mrs. Earlybird, all beautifully dressed, enters the 
room just as the clock strikes seven. She is 
cheerful, chatty and pleased, and makes her host 
and hostess feel perfectly satisfied with their en- 
tertainment. The party begins when Mrs. Early- 
bird gets there. What wonder that she has more 
invitations than she can accept, from October to 
June ? What wonder that she is so popular ? 

Mrs. Heavyfeather, on the contrary, is aston- 
ished that, with all her spending of money, 
and her old family, and her grand house 
and her 'fine clothes, and her frequent en- 
tertainments, she is not asked to the little 
dinners, the pleasant small feasts. She is sad 
over her want of popularity. Does she know 
that she is a haughty hostess, giving a very 
cold forefinger to half her guests, while she is 
very warm and cordial to the other half ? Does 
she know that her face assumes an entirely 
different expression when she speaks to Mrs. 
Oldbones from what it wears when Mrs. Nouveau 



THE AMERICA!* CODE OF MANNERS. 17 ( J 

Riche appears? Mrs. Heavyfeather despises a 
great portion of the human family. She does not 
like any one who cannot radiate some sort of 
importance upon her. 

Why, then, does she invite them ? There is the 
illogical part of it. Mrs. Heavyfeather knows 
that, to be a success, her party must be very 
crowded. To be a success she must have not 
only nobs, but snobs. She wants to bow low to 
the nobs, and to patronize the snobs. It is a 
part of her ignoble nature to do both ; and she 
likes to assure Mrs. Nouveau Riche, with a very 
mutilated bow, that she hopes, " really, that she 
is very well — indeed, quite well !" 

To patronize is a very great necessity to some 
natures. There is not much opportunity for 
the exercise of it in a land where all men 
are free and equal — but there is somo. 
A haughty hostess deprives herself of her own 
inheritance. Every one wishes to feel kindly 
to the woman who asks him to her house. 
There is something very gracious in the act ; and 
a man comes prepared to make himself agreeable, 
and a woman hopes to both be received graciously 
and to appear pleasantly. If the hostess ihrow? 



180 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

a bucket of cold water over them by her cold, 
frigid and inhospitable manner, both men and 
women wish that they had stayed away. 

English women have great pride of birth, and 
are by nature and education haughty. They 
know their importance, and they receive, from 
childhood, a certain homage from their in- 
feriors. The cottager bows as he passes, and the 
cottager's wife drops a courtesy to the lady of the 
great house. The servants are infinitely respect- 
ful, as they would be turned out without a char- 
acter instantly if they were not. All this tends 
to give an air of hauteur and dignity to an Eng- 
lish lady, as she is always made aware of her own 
importance. But they are generally charming 
hostesses — they learn it as an art. They are 
taught early the great duties and the responsibili- 
ties of a hostess. They are taught how to re- 
ceive, how to make people welcome, how to be 
the head of the house and the core of welcome. 
No one would care to hear, in an English country 
house, that Lady Amabel had made herself 
disagreeable. Neither the Duke, her father, nor 
the Earl, her husband, would ever forgive her if 
she had made the country Member's wife un 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 181 

happy or had neglected the curate. "Noblesse 
oblige " is written over those stately castle Yv T alls. 
English hostesses are far more to be depended 
upon than American hostesses, who, in the 
midst of great wealth, and with every means of 
entertaining, are often rude, neglectful and very 
dull, because, perhaps, they have no instinct of 
hospitality and no sort of knowledge of their 
duties. 

We would advise every young American hos- 
tess to study well the art of being a model one. 
She should improve herself upon all subjects of 
etiquette ; she should especially create for herself 
a cordial and polite manner ; she should try to be 
as serene as a summer's day, and to keep all that 
troubles her out of sight. If she entertains, she 
should remember that her guests are before her- 
self, and that her house is theirs. She does not 
give a party to herself, but to them. Above all, 
let her avoid the vulgarity of stooping low to 
her rich or titled guests, while she snubs the 
rustic clergyman from the country. If there is 
a plain and modest person in the room, let her 
especially direct her kindness to that obscure 
corner where he stands. Noblesse oblige ! 



182 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

CHAPTER XIV. 

THE ETIQUETTE OF CARDS. 

A CARD is the beginning and the end 
of etiquette. Ic is the Alpha and 
Omega of all social intercourse. It is the 
first introduction, and the final leave-taking. 
Those little pieces of white paste-board, if 
imperishable, will in their amount, their many 
/ascriptions, puzzle the New Zealander, who 
disinters New York after 4,000 years, as we 
are now examining old Egypt. What are they ? 
will be the question. What do they repre- 
sent? l Was it the money of that strange 
people ?" will ask the Brugsch Bey of the future. 

Indeed, the card business multiplies itself so 
infinitely, that a wit once suggested that there 
should be a " clearing house "for cards, where 
Mr. Brown and Mr. Smith and Mr. Jones should 
leave their cards for each other on the first day 
of November, and by this interchange, carefully 
managed by clerks, escape all the ennui of leaving 
cards during the year. The idea is a good one. 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 183 

unfortunately impracticable, as the sentiment of 
personal attention lingers around the card still. 

The card should be a plain piece of white card- 
board, not glazed, and the name should be 
engraved in script. Some people still cling to 
old Roman letters, to old English, and now 
and then a fac-si.nile of the handwriting. 
These are not in the highest fashion, which 
reduces all things to the simplest form. 
A lady's card should be larger than that of a gen- 
tleman, and should have her full addresr, and 
her residence in the left-hand corner, unless she 
wishes to use her card, as she often does, for in- 
vitations to teas and small parties. Gentlemen's 
cards almost invariably, in England, have the 
address in the left-hand corner. 

In leaving cards, the lady of the house leaves 
her own, her husband's, and those of her sons 
and daughters who are out, on families whom 
she knows or wishes to know. If this is a first 
call, the civility should be returned within a week. 

In giving an entertainment, a lady incloses her 
husband's card to all who are invited for the firs f 
time. It is equivalent to a call on his part. In 
calling, after a dinner or party,, the lady also 



184 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

leaves her husband's card, as he, in this country, 
'is almost always too busy to make calls. 

First invitations should always be responded 
to courteously, cards left, and a proper recogni- 
tion of the civility, even if the invited guests do 
not wish to keep up the acquaintance. It often 
happens to those who have a very large ac- 
quaintance, and who have met with, per- 
haps, adversity or sorrow of some kind, that 
they cannot enlarge their acquaintance easily. 
Let it be then manifested carefully and with 
true attention to the feelings of those who 
invite you, that you are obliged and compli- 
mented by their manifest kindness, even if you 
cannot avail yourself of it. To return a card, or 
to say " This has been sent by mistake," and 
other so-called s??itbs, which have heretofore been 
perpetrated in New York, is to write yourself 
down a " snob" and a vulgar person. 

The younger should call on the elder. The 
new-comer has a perfect right to send his cards 
to the old resident. The sending of a card hurts 
no one's self-respect, and if it is not returned no 
one is killed. The natural delicacy of every sen- 
sible person will prevent his intrusion upon a 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 185 

social queen, whose position is so very well 
known to be of the highest lhat she can discern 
from her lofty station whom she wishes to know, 
and whose visiting list is probably over full. 
Two persons, however, who are upon the same 
social plane need never fear to call first. It is 
generally regarded as a compliment, and the 
person who has the most perfect self-respect is 
generally the one to do it. 

The custom of making universal morning calls 
has become impossible in New York ; therefore 
most ladies have a day, or three receptions, or a 
tea, thus allowing all their friends to see them 
once a year. If impossible to go to see them on 
these occasions, send a card for every member of 
the family invited, and your duty to that lady is 
over for the season. 

No lady leaves her own card upon a gentle- 
man. She sends the card of her husband and 
son, if she chooses, and then asks him to dinner, 
if such a civility be necessary. 

When young ladies leave their mother's card, 
there is the same respect expressed as if the 
mother called in person. Many ladies who are 
elderly, or invalid, or devote, or otherwise disin- 



186 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

clined to social labors, leave all this" work for 
the younger, who are fresh and strong. It is a 
great pity that so many American mothers do 
retire from the social governance of their 
families ; but, if they do, the card is still all- 
potent, and the lady visited must consider her- 
self visited by the lady of the ether house. 

Cards should always be left for guests visiting 
at a house, if the lady calling knows of their 
presence. This, of course, in a large city, i3 not 
always possible ; but, if possible, it is very civil. 

P. P. C. cards are no longer left or sent when 
people are simply leaving town for the summer. 
Indeed, only when a prolonged trip abroad is 
proposed is the custom ever observed. The 
bridge across the Atlantic is now so short and 
easy a one that few people consider it neces- 
sary to mention that they propose crossing it. 
They are always in order if a foreigner is 
leaving a country where he has been a visitor. 
Indeed, a fashionable woman, on coming in 
from her afternoon drive, reads the cards 
on her hall table as a merchant reads his 
day-book or ledger. It is her debit and credit 
account. It is a record of her social bankruptcy 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 187 

or her soundness. Some ladies have so large an 
acquaintance that they go to protest at once, and 
hope that by giving some receptions next winter, 
etc., they may pay their debts ; others have so 
small a one that they are always creditors - and 
never debtors. For all, the little white messen- 
ger, engraved with a name, is the ready-money 
of society. 

In Europe calls are returned in twenty-four 
hours. There are no exceptions to this rule, and 
often a titled foreigner, or a quiet gentleman 
from Oxford, or a diplomatist, is startled and 
wounded because his card is not returned imme- 
diately. Here Americans should be more partic- 
ular about this, and the formalities of dress 
should be observed. An American general was 
thought to be intentionally rude once, in Europe, 
because he returned the call of another general 
in his traveling dress. He thought it all right ; he 
had called or not as he pleased in America, in a 
new or an old coat, the subject of etiquette had 
never engaged any of his personal attention ; 
but it is the observance of these formalities 
which makes society polished and possible. Were 
there not some such laws society would be full 



188 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

of careless men and boors, and would relapse 
into savagery. Men should always dress for din- 
ner, and should never call on a lady in the even- 
ing in the season unless in dress coat and white 
cravat, with feet neatly dressed. A black cravat 
is permissible if a gentleman is in mourning. 

• ' If a gentleman does not respect me sufficiently 
to dress himself freshly before he calls on me I 
do not wish to see him," said a lady of immense 
popularity in New York, and she absolutely mado 
the law of her salon peremptory, as all ladies 
should. 

As for " watering-place etiquette," it has never 
been settled, and never will be. People who 
know each other will nod and exchange visits 
at neighboring villas and boarding houses and 
hotels if they wish, or neglect it if they wish. 
There is no law about it. If a stranger arrives 
it is very proper to send a card, and to make the 
acquaintance, if a lady has been staying a long 
time in the hotel. 

If Mrs. Oldbones receives a card from anybody 
in her hotel she is bound, after suitable inquiries 
as to the respectability of the parties, to return 
it: She need not know the people intimately 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 189 

afterward, but she should always recognize the 
civility. 

Cards should be left in person on hearing 
of illness, or the death of a friend, or any 
trouble which society can sympathize with, 
whether at home or at a watering place. Good 
nature, kindness of heart being the foundation of 
good manners, they should always be the expo- 
nents of these feelings, whenever and wherever 
they may be called upon to express themselves. 

When a gentleman becomes engaged to a lady 
he must inform all his own family and particular 
friends, and ask them to call upon her. The 
sooner this duty is performed the better the deed. 
No gentleman should ever notice or receive as his 
friends again those who fail to pay this attention 
to his betrothed. 

No lady should, however, presume on her en- 
gagement to a gentleman to call on his friends. 
She must wait to be invited. 

A New Year's call used to be considered 
enough in old New York for the whole year's 
civilities, but that fashion has, owing to the size 
of ihe city, become obsolete, and few ladies re- 
ceive. 



100 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

If a card is printed " Mr. and Mrs. John Brown," 
one should be left on the lady with the corner 
turned down if she is not receiving, and an- 
other, with "Mr. John Brown" only, for the 
husband. The one card of " Mr. John Brown" 
is enough for all the younger members of the 
family. If cards are left once in the season they 
need not be left again, excepting after an invita- 
tion to dinner, or to a ball or party. It is not 
necessary to leave cards after a tea. 

It was once considered an intentional rudeness 
if a lady gave out that she received on Thursdays 
for people to call on any other day or to leave a 
card otherwise than personally, or to send a card 
by mail. But in a great city these rules become 
inoperative, for no lady can fulfill all her duties 
in person. The only insult which a society per- 
son is bound to resent is the persistent ignoring 
of these rules. A card sent by mail is now 
recognized as an attention, ladies having found 
that the distances, the engagements and the 
carriage hire will not permit of their making all 
their calls. 

If a gentleman is invited by a lady to call upon 
her, he should call within a week. He is not to 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 191 

be forgiven if, after being invited, he does not 
call at least within a month. Some New York 
young gentlemen never call, but go on receiving 
and accepting invitations for years. Some kind 
friend should, at least, leave cards for them in 
such cases. 

When young ladies are betrothed in Europe, 
the fiance is regularly introduced to all of his 
bride's family by card. This is not done here, 
nor are visits of congratulation en regie. They 
are paid, however, by the members of the family 
and the intimate friends, and generally a number 
of little dinners follow. 

The conduct of engaged people toward each 
other is nowise regulated here as in Europe, but 
it may be said generally that they should not be 
seen alone together at watering places too much, 
should not display fondness in public, and should 
not render other people uncomfortable. 

Calling hours in New York are from two o'clock 
until six, and, unless expressly stated on a lady's 
card, one can consider these hours respectful to 
her. If she issues a card as being at home be- 
tween four and six, it is the height of rudeness to 
call earlier. 



192 THE AMERICAN CODE Q£ LIAKSERS. 

If, by any chance, a lady is admitted to a draw- 
ing-room by a stupid servant, and the lady of the 
house finds it inconvenient to receive, the lady 
calling should not feel offended if she is told so. 
A hostess may be lying down, or ill with a head- 
ache, or may be very busy, or she may fear to 
keep her guest waiting while she dresses. 
She has, perhaps, instructed her servant to say 
that she is engaged, but he has, no doubt, for- 
gotten that ; so she is very awkwardly placed. A 
message civilly worded should never offend. 

A card should never be left by a young gentle- 
men for a young lady without also including one 
for her mother ; or, rather, he should first inquire 
for her mother, and, if possible, the mother 
should assist her daughter to receive. Calls made 
on a reception day do not require separate 
calls afterward, nor need a gentleman leave 
but one card behind him on such a day % 
Indeed, the habit of leaving a dozen cards was so 
overdone by one young gentleman, that a little 
boy of the family collected them together and 
handed them all back to him. There is such a 
thing as being too polite. 

It is a very common practice now with people 



TITE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 155 

wlio hold their position in society somewhat by 
virtue of assumption, rather than by any merit, 
to give a ball or a reception, and, while inviting 
half their most desirable acquaintances to the 
ball, simply send their visiting card to the other 
half. This is an unkind thing to do — a rudeness. 
It would be much better to omit the visiting 
card. The return for such a mutilated civility 
would properly be a card by post, if, indeed, any 
notice should be taken of it at all. 

As for weddings in church, there is a quertioji. 
Where shall the cards be sent ? How often are 
we asked to see a couple married in church when 
we neither know the bride's mother nor the fu- 
ture address of the married pair ? Shall we leave 
cards with the sexton ? It is impossible to call 
on a bride until she sends her married address. 

A lady often uses her visiting card as the me- 
dium for an invitation. The " four-o'clock tea " 
is almost always given thus informally, while all 
should call personally and leave a card who can. 
There should be a wide forgiveness for those who 
are obliged to send their cards by post or by a 
servant. The principle of politeness remains the 
same. 



194 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 



CHAPTER XV. 

FLIRTATION AND INCREASING FASTNESS OF 

MANNER. 

IN our American Code of Manners we cannot 
afford to paint merely one side of the shield ; 
we must look at the dark as well as at the light 
side ; we must ignore nothing. And the melan- 
choly truths — the facts which tell against us as a 
nation — must be recognized if we hope to improve 
or to gain any credence for our opinions on what 
is proper in the subjects which we are con- 
sidering. 

The freedom which is the proud boast of 
Americans sometimes seems to deprive parents 
of their just rights in restraining young girls 
on their entrance into society. They should 
scrutinize carefully the men who are admitted 
to the home circle, or the saddest results may 
follow. There is a visible tendency to increas- 
ing freedom of manners in modern society. 
Prudent restraints have been removed, and 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 195 

old-time traditions set at naught. There has 
risen a class of women — a fast school — both in 
America and in England, which, as the London 
Times says, is " vitiating the tone, undermin- 
ing the character, and corrupting the whole 
atmosphere of society." Some of the deni- 
zens of this school seem to achieve a sort of 
success, and rule as society queens by reason 
of beauty and talents, spite of their disregard 
of the high standards of good morals. 

Innocent young women, pretty, and naturally 
desirous of admiration, look at these women — 
wonder and admire. Unfortunately, too, they 
copy them — sometimes with great talent and suc- 
cess, sometimes awkwardly, and these failures be- 
come only laughing-stocks. 

This tendency of short-sighted people to gain 
advantages somehow — honestly if they can, but to 
get the thing desired — is the oldest mistake in the 
world. 

It is the mistake of the gambler, who gains in 
an hour the fortune which a hard-working man 
may pant after for years in vain. It is the mis- 
take of the superficial in every profession. 



196 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

> 

Quackery succeeds where modest merit fails in 
more professions than that of medicine. 

The social rules which are in danger of fall- 
ing into contempt in our day have an intrin- 
sic value. The prevalence of free and easy 
manners tends to evil. The women who have 
been noted for their flirtations before marriage 
and their Platonic friendships after marriage, 
should not be the models of modest debu- 
tantes. A writer says : " Whether it be in talk 
or in deed, in manners, in style, or in dress, 
the age is certainty everywhere showing a very 
open contempt of the safeguards which once 
formed the advance posts of propriety." 
Yet the women who know how to sail so very 
near the wind, yet not altogether renounce 
the restraints of law and opinion, are often the 
fashion of the day. 

Flirtation thus being one of the high roads to 
fashionable notoriety, and, falling in with tlje 
elderly vanity and egotism of silly women, we 
may not be surprised to see the woman of fifty 
assuming the graces of sixteen, and occupying 
the corridors and piazzas of watering-place hotels 
with feeble attendant swains. It is a melancholy 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 197 

spectacle to those who desire to respect or love 
the woman, particularly to her sons and daughters. 
But her end is gained if somebody says : " Oh, 
Mrs. Feathercap is such a very fascinating 
woman to gentlemen !" She dresses, poses, and 
lives painfully, to reach this goal, and becomes 
the worst model for her young countrywomen to 
follow. 

Flirtation among the young is forgiven, because 
it is very like the best and noblest event of 
human life — a true and honest love affair. It is 
a very good artificial rose — very like a real 
one ; therefore we prefer it. Youth and high 
spirits being good things to have, we forgive 
their excesses and pardon their follies. There is 
no doubt that a coquettish and flirtatious girl, 
however, although she may become very fashion- 
able, the reigning belle and the toast, is danger- 
ously periling her chances for a good marriage by 
her habits of freebootery. No man cares to marry 
a free lance. Let her catch her fish, land him 
safely, and then, as a young married woman, 
let her go in and win as a married flirt. She 
will gain a fashionable position and a detestable 
reputation. 



198 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

Such, are some of the evils of a society which 
is, as a German Minister at Washington described 
it, u all scrabble." To scrabble for a position, an 
invitation, a fortune, an heiress, a " good match, " 
is the natural destiny of a young American who 
has everything to gain and nothing to lose. There 
is nothing to reverence, to look up to, socially. 
Every man (and woman) carries the god whom he 
would serve in his own bosom. He must be lofty, 
mean, generous, grand, low, honest, or the re- 
verse, for himself. He has no precedents of nobil- 
ity, as to manners — no standard ; he is his own 
ancestor. 

The excellent common sense of the American, 
the natural respect for law and order, has placed 
the American gentleman in the past at the very 
head of etiquette, has given him grave and admir- 
able manners ; and thousands of American wo- 
men have been ladies in the highest sense of the 
word, from innate refinement and purity. But 
particularly since our war, and the sudden 
making of great fortunes, the coming up of 
new people from every part of the country, we 
do see a lamentable break in the refinement of 
manners and in the correctness of conduct of 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 1Q[} 

American women. They not only outrage eti- 
quette, but they are applauded for so doing. 

Such, of course, is the criticism upon that por- 
tion of our society known as the ultra-fashionable. 
" Do not," said an English gentleman— himself of 
the highest aristocracy— " do not consider the pro- 
fessional beauties, and the fast women who com- 
pose the set of the Prince of Wales, as types of 
English society. They are the fungi which grow 
on the old oak. When the Prince becomes king 
he will kick the whole fabric of fashionable fast- 
ness out-of-doors." . 

It would be well if we could look forward 
to the day when any such regeneration would 
come to us. But we have no royal breath to 
blow the bubble away. It is to be feared that 
these are the setters of a fashion which may last 
for years. 

Now let us look at the results of such manners 
and such morality. . 

We all know that if a gambler makes a large 
fortune and attempts to enter society what a cer- 
tain ostracism awaits him. He cannot be elected 
to a club ; no lady will, if she has any respect for 
herself, invite him to a ball at her own house. 



200 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

He is a tabooed man, and the wealth he holds 
carries a curse with it. 

Now, what sort of a fate accompanies the fast 
girl who has married for money or place, has 
misbehaved herself, and has become a divorcee, 
even if she marries an earl ? 

Can she, even in that lofty station, get away 
from her shame ? Can she travel to any city, or 
country, or solitude, where her crime is not 
known ? There is a brand on her forehead which 
the coronet cannot hide. Anonymous letters 
follow her. Her eyes glance furtively about the 
Casino, the Koursaal, the concert-room, the hotel, 
to see if those who knew her when innocent are 
looking now ! The man who has married her is 
watching her furtively, for who can trust such a 
woman ? Splendid misery ! — the worst kind of 
misery is her portion. Do not envy such a 
countess, young women of America ! nor copy 
her flirtation or her fastness. Her glory is noth- 
ing but ashes. 

Remember, too, looking at the subject from 
the low standpoint of self-interest, that a 
copy is never so good as the original. Perhaps 
this so-called successful woman has an extra- 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 201 

ordinary talent, a brilliant wit, a remarkable 
fascination, which you have not. Those gifts 
were but the ignis fatuus which swamped her ; 
yet they were brilliant, delusive, and led men on. 
You may, indeed, have those gifts in being " fast 
and flirtatious ;" without them you will only 
make a conspicuous failure, and no one will say : 
" But she was, poor girl, so beautiful, so gifted !" 
No, they will simply say: "She was such a 
dreadful fool !" 

No success which is not honestly gained is 
worth a pin. If it is money, it stings ; if it is 
place and position, it becomes the shirt of Nessus. 

But for the well-mannered and well-behaved 
American woman, what a noble success, what 
a perfect fame, what a delightful future ! She 
is the present and the future of American 
nobility. All men bow down to her. She is the 
queen of the man who loves her ; he treats her 
with every respect. She is to be the proud 
mother of sons and daughters who, to their 
latest day, will say: "Let me be a gentleman, 
let me be a lady, for my mother taught me how 
to be one. It was she who taught me honor, 
lcyalty, duty, respect, politeness, kindness, the 



202 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

law of love. Let me aspire to be what my mother 
w T as, and I need not fear to present myself at any 
court. I can read of Sir Fhilip Sidney without a 
"blush. I can make myself a type o2 all that is 
perfect in etiquette and breeding if I but re- 
member her maxims and her example. ' ' 

Will that be the self -communing of the children 
of yonder countess ? No ! they will color with 
guilty shame when her name is mentioned. She 
has thrown away the divine right which a 
mother has— or should have — to the respect of 
her children. 

An American woman, therefore, has more 
reason for being not only good, but elegant and 
refined than any other woman. She has to make 
precedent and public opinion. She has a patriotic 
reason for her good conduct. She is the Republic. 
Let her not pose to become that shameless God- 
dess of Liberty whom the French revolutionists 
carried about in a cart ; let her rather be that 
gentle-eyed Madonna whom the Christian Church 
worships. 

The institution of chivalry first, and the Chris- 
tian Church afterward, raised woman from the 
lowest position and placed her in the highest. 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 203 

She gained all that respect, affection and dignity 
which alone can make her lot endurable. For 
women must suffer much— it is their destiny. 

It seems impossible, looking at the question 
philosophically, that a woman could willingly go 
back to the position of Delilah. 

Those who saw the great actor, Salvini, saw 
with him an excellent actress named Piamonti. 
She played Delilah to his Samson, and every one 
who saw her admired the genius with which, 
when she came out into the crowd, she assumed 
the position and face and expression of an out- 
cast. 

Beautiful, powerful, beloved when with her 
master alone — treacherous, fascinating and terri- 
ble when she was shearing his glorious hair — she 
became cringing, timorous, like a hunted animal, 
when men looked at her in the crowd. She 
kept away from the honest women ; their eyes 
hurt her like daggers. She was like a blind 
person when a young girl walked past her. 
Disgrace, shame, death was the portion of 
Delilah ! It was a great conception. And 
yet, if they did but know it, fast and flirta- 
tious women are imitating Delilah. Her fasei- 



20-1 THE AMERICAN CODE OP MANNERS. 

nation and treachery, her prostitution of her 
charms — this is what they copy ; they call it by 
a different name, that is all. They demoralize 
every man who approaches them, for a man's 
idea of virtue is that which a woman teaches 
him. The worst of men respect, honor and rever- 
ence a strict woman. She is a power in the state, 
and a " thousand liveried angels lackey her." It 
is in the power of every woman to make some 
man, perhaps many men, good or "bad. She holds 
his salvation in her hands. 

These are grave reflections for a book of eti- 
quette, but they are not unnecessary ones. 
Etiquette must be the expression of the manners 
of a nation— its manners express its morals. 
No country can have any pretensions to good 
manners unless the women are modest and most 
dignified. They carry in their gentle hands the 
only rod of empire to which American men will 
bow. Let them remember this, and try to do all 
that an empress should do — be a model to look 
up to, a pattern in every virtue, a suggestion of 
all grace, and, above all, to convey a gentle dig- 
nity and reserve in speed. , gesture, manner. 

American women talk and laugh too loud. 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 205 

They are seldom taught to speak with a clear, anti- 
nasal voice ; they are often boisterous, and even 
at Vassar College, where women receive a most ad- 
mirable education, and at the fashionable board- 
ing-schools in New York, there is not enough at- 
tention given to elocution as applied to ordinary 
conversation and reading aloud, that beautiful 
art so much neglected. 

The English are far ahead of us in this ac- 
complishment of a beautiful speaking voice and 
a refined intonation. An English parlor-maid 
will say, " Might I offer you a chair ?" in a voice 
which almost any New York lady could envy. 
Whether it is our climate, and the many severe 
colds which our ancestors must have taken on 
Plymouth Rock, and which effectually ruined 
the larynx of their descendants, it is certain 
that the bronchial membrane and the larynx does 
not respond as well in this country as in England. 
Hear what a fine, broad, open note an English- 
woman sounds when she begins to talk ! Sweet, 
too ! not discordant, nasal, poor, as are so many 
of our voices. " A low,' sweet voice is an excel- 
lent thing in woman," and it does much to refine 
a coarse appearance, if one is afflicted with such. 



206 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

But American women are almost always beau- 
tiful. It is only when the peacock begins to sing 
or talk that we discover that beauty does not 
always strike in. Let every American woman 
study her voice and her elocution. It is the next 
best thing to avoiding " flirtation and fast man- 
ners.^" 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 20? 

CHAPTER XVI. 

THE MANNERS OF YOUNG MEN. 



" ~\T7 HEN J despair of the Republic," said 
f y an eminent statesman, u I look at an 
American "boy, and my fading hopes revive." 

There are no young men In the world with 
more faultless manners than the best American 
young men. Manly, simple, unaffected, respect- 
ful, and remarkably graceful, the young American 
man is conceded to be admirable the world over. 
A graduate of Harvard or Yale, a cadet from 
West Point, a youth who has worked his way up 
from poverty to good position, it is all one, they 
are wonderfully well-mannered. There is some- 
thing in the air of equality and of liberty which 
is good for them. They behave better, as a class, 
than do the young women of America, for they 
are so chivalrous that they have partly spoiled 
the women. 

Compare a young American of eighteen to a 
young Englishman of that age and you find 
that the Englishman is a cub. The latter is 



208 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

long in ripening. He has not the ready speech 
of the American, or his ease, or his pleas- 
ing address. He may know more, but he 
does not appear so well. The Englishman will 
be a finer man at sixty than the American, 
but he is not half so attractive in youth. 
Compare the young Frenchman of the same 
age ; he is not half so noble. He tells lies, the 

Q French boy, which the American boy despises. 

* It is not considered by the Latins a disgrace to 
lie ; but the Anglo-Saxon abhors a lie. 

Arsene Houssaye says of a young Frenchman : 
" In what does he differ from a pretty woman ? 
He is not so pretty, and that is about all ; in 
everything else, about on the same level. His 
mind is occupied about in the same way, and 
when he has thought over his toilette, his furni- 
ture, how to play his little parts of a young gen- 
tleman, he is at the end of his chapter of ideas. 
I studied his bachelor neglegse, his pantaloons 
with socks attached, his charming summer coat 
with vest to match, and the exquisite mauve 
cravat which he wore around his standing collar, 
with its fresh turned-down points. His chin is 
smooth shaven, but his ample whiskers are joiner 



THE AMEBIC AX CODE OF MANNERS. 209 

oy his mustache, and over his face there flits, by 
turns, a blase air and a look of self-satisfaction. 
His hands are white and soft, and on his pink 
fingers he wears a large ring ; from time to time 
he lifts his hands to let the blood run out of them. 
Sometimes, by a mechanical gesture, he carries 
them to his ear, which is small, or to his collar, 
a chef oPoeuvre of taste and audacity. He un- 
derstands his smile ; he moderates it, or keeps it 
half-way between ease and e?inui." 

This is an admirable picture of a French fop. 
We have a few successf ul copies in this country, 
but not many. Our young men are manly, busy 
and unaffected as a rule. 

No wonder Arsene Houssaye asks, " What is he 
good for ? 5 ' as he pursues this masterly sketch of 
the feeble, vapid, selfish creature whom he 
sketches. 

" In my time," says he, " men were crazy about 
politics and literature. I belonged to the society 
for the regeneration of the human race. ' ' 

It is true that the girlish young man of to-day 
is a product unknown in the past. The fo]? 
and dandy of the days of Count d'Orsay and 
Cecil and Lord Byron— what men were they ? 



210 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

Poets, sculptors and soldiers. " The puppies 
fight well," said the Duke of Wellington, in 
Spain. 

But our puppies of to-day — would they fight ? 
■—could they write ? No ! a thousand times, no ! 

The fop of the nineteenth century, looking 
about to marry money, is the most useless and 
ridiculous creature in all the world ? 

No wonder that great Hotspur says of a certain 
lord, " who was perfumed like a milliner :" 

" For he made mc mad 
To see him shine so brisk and smell so sweet 
And talk so like a waiting gentlewoman." 

Hotspur would have many occasions to-day to 
thus adjure the effete popinjays, even in New 
York. But he would not, we are grateful to say, 
find many at large in America, nor would he find 
many "untaught knaves— unmannerly. " 'The 
exception proves the rale. 

The young men of our new country, however, 
should study manners, and proper dress, and 
proper courtesy ; it is their duty, if they have 
not already done so. Their tailors and their 
observation will tell them how to dress. Neatness 
"tiould be their first and firmest ally; then no 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 211 

matter how plain their clothes. A young man 
should never be too fine for his work. Coarse 
heavy shoes for walking, coarse and plain clothes 
in the morning, and always a change for dinner 
and the evening. Fresh stockings and neat- 
looking feet are indispensable, and clean linen is 
the very alphabet of gentility. He must remem- 
ber to not intrude, even on the people who invite 
him most, to call always after an invitation, to 
make his calls short, " to suffer himself to be de- 
sired' ' rather than make himself common. These 
are the merest preliminaries of good breeding, 
In the matter of attention to ladies let him re- 
member Dean Swift's advice: "A man's atten- 
tions to a woman should never be so vague as 
to be misunderstood, or so pronounced as to 
alarm." Let him, if he wishes to marry a lady, 
go about it honestly. There is no matter so im- 
portant as this in all etiquette, that a man ap- 
proach his possible bride by the straight high 
road of honor. He should ask her parents for 
Permission to address her before he asks her 
own. 

And after the engagement he must still remem- 
ber that she is not his. He must be careful of 



212 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

those appearances which might compromise her. 
He must remember that engagements may be 
broken, and at all events preserve her for future 
happiness with another, if Fate so wills it. 

This is the duty of a high bred and chivalrous 
man, such as most American men are. They arc 
the noblest men in the world. 

There are, to be sure, American savages— men 
who use the bowie-knife, who drink like the 
hippopotamus, who fight duels, play cards, are 
wildly, furiously passionate, unsafe, desperate. 
They dress like fiends, wearing, perhaps, a con- 
glomerate of frock coat, white tie and broad 
Quaker hat, or dress coat and black pantaloons in 
the morning. They neither know nor care for eti- 
quette, and yet, what have these savages which 
foreigners have not ? Of what trait can even 
they boast ? 

They have a respect *cr women. Their speech 
grows decent, their manners kind, their excesses 
are restrained if a woman walks near them. 

It is a splendid national peculiarity. The 
London rough has no such soft spot. He 
beats his women ; he insults all women ; ho 
neither fears nor respects them. As for the 



THE AMERICAN CODE OE MANNERS. 21b 

Frenchman, his external politeness toward the 
beau sexe is very marked when he wishes to pro- 
pitiate, but his contempt for them is always 
patent, and his cruelty is that of all weak, selfish 
and hideously-corrupt creatures. He can see the 
wife of his bosom starve with the greatest 
possible complacency, and he has no pity on his 
cast-off lady-love. Yet, simply respecting women, 
the American young man, starting as he does in 
nine cases out of ten from the soil, having no 
antecedents, can, with a little attention to the 
recognized code of etiquette, become the most 
perfect gentleman in the world, for he has the 
foundation. 

His native respect for women will teach him 
not to smoke in her presence, without asking 
permission. He will pay all attention to elderly 
people ; he will dress himself properly for all and 
every occasion when he is to meet ladies. 

Above all things, he will restrain any propensity 
to take too much wine at dinner on any festive 
occasion. 

A man half drunk is so ridiculous an animal, so 
utterly to be spurned from decent society, that it 
seems almost impossible that he should be 



214 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

tolerated. Yet the fault seems to be one which 
society, for some mysterious reason, condones, 
particularly in rich young men. A drunken man 
is so unsafe, he is so much a marplot, so 
inconvenient and so disagreeable, that this 
is a defect which would be supposed to 
be irremediable. Unfortunately it is not so. 
There is too much respect for wealth in this 
country. It buys silence. If a poor young man 
dared to appear drunk in a lady's house, would 
he ever be asked again ? Never. If a millionaire 
appears drunk, it is called a youthful indiscre- 
tion. 

A certain brutality of manner, adopted from 
the English, is affected by some of our young 
men. They answer harshly, affect not to see a 
lady to whom they owe civilities, and try to be- 
come boors, even if they are not. This style is 
seen much in men of mixed blood, perhaps the 
half -Germans, half -French, half -English. It is a 
vejry poor style, and betrays the snob. It is not 
a common American fault, still it exists. It 
should be frowned down ; it is the fault of 
mediocre men. 

But, as Houssav? s#;p? : " Young men are 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 215 

moderate nowadays, even in their follies. They are 
afraid of excess ; they cut grooves for their vices 
to run in ; they are bourgeois, who carefully avoid 
fatiguing, much more, exposing themselves." 

Houssaye does not believe evidently that there 
are Sir Philip Sidneys, "admirable Crichtons," in 
these days, but he is wrong. A shipwreck, a 
battlefield, a field day in Wall street, brings them 
to the front. Men are as noble as ever ; there are 
as many heroes. The occasion finds them, and in 
every newspaper office, every merchant's count- 
ing room, in all the walks of the professions, 
are the silent heroes. What a hero is the young 
doctor, who works day and night succoring the 
wounded, helping the sick, tending the dying ! 
What a hero the young soldier, who has first thor- 
oughly conquered himself ! What a hero is the 
young bank clerk, preserving his honesty while 
there is temptation all around him ! What a hero 
the young man doing honest work anywhere ! 
lie shames the pouncet-box hero ; he is the Hot- 
spur of the field of honor. 

Women love these heroes. They are the men 
to marry. The other kind do very well for the 
leadership of the German, but the true women do 



16 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

not care for them. One real man entering a draw- 
ing-room with his record of work behind him will 
scare away the fops as ghosts retire at cock-crow. 

Young men should avcid boasting. It is some- 
times a great drawback to the success of even a 
very energetic and admirable man that he boasts. 
The first person should appear but little in his 
conversation. "J" is a very good pronoun, but 
it should be kept in reserve. The egotistical 
women succeed better than the egotistical men, 
but both are detestable. 

A man should respect the decencies of life, and 
— to do them justice — most men do. Women are 
far more apt to tell doubtful witticisms, to repeat 
double entendres, than young men are. They do 
this from ignorance, no doubt. Old men sin most 
frequently in this particular ; young men are apt 
to be far more decent than old men. 

The most fatal mistake that a young man 
can make for his future happiness is to have 
a serious flirtation with a married woman. A 
thousand harpies are abroad, particularly in 
New York, who are looking out for young 
men whom they can ruin. These harpies are 
in very good society ; they keep up appear- 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 217 

ances, but they secure, first, a thoughtless 
young man's attentions, then his affections, and 
then they suck his blood. More murders are 
committed by these heartless, vain flirts than by 
all the brigands. They are the most monstrous 
frauds ; they are the leeches of society ; they are 
apples of Sodom. Let young men beware of 
them. Far more despicable than the poor 
wretches of the pave, who pursue their dreadful 
trade at least openly, these hypocrites are steal- 
ing all of hope, all of life, all of virtue, from a 
young man, whom they attack and seduce before 
the eyes of his mother and his sister. 

It is the most honest, the most unsuspecting 
young man who falls, generally. If a man goes 
into such a flirtation with his eyes open no one 
cares what happens to him. He deserves to be 
shot, and in all countries but this he is shot. Here 
a bloodless duel sometimes takes place and both 
the principals return to society, not at all hurt, and 
the lady goes on — quietly deceiving her husband. 

A young man's manners and accomplishments 
can both be elegant and numerous without in- 
juring his usefulness. A graceful fellow, who can 
sing a song, quote poetry, who shows cultivation 



218 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

in every word he utters— such a young man is the 
most valuable addition to the group at a country 
house, the party in the city, and the lawn tennis 
club. He is sought for a dinner party ; he is in- 
estimable. 

To study manner — to make that enamel on solid 
gold which has characterized such men as Everett, 
Motley, Livingston, Jay, Bayard, McClellan and 
Story — is an admirable study. The men w T ko have 
influenced their race have been men of line man- 
ners. In spite of Madame de Remusat, who was 
an ungrateful legitimatist, a false serving-woman, 
a forgetful and envious nature, we shall believe 
that Napoleon Bonaparte had very fine manners. 
No man could have paid such compliments to his 
soldiers as he did, without manners. 

If manner has sometimes been a false enamel, 
covering copper instead of gold, we must still 
admire it. The graceful and respectful speech, 
the pretty and frank smile, the courteous bow, 
the readiness to give place — who does not admire 
it ? In such cases the manner covers a multitude 
of sins. We forgive such a young man, even if 
from early want of training he should eat with 
his knife or come to dinner in a frock coat. 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 219 



CHAPTER XVII. 

REAL AND CONVENTIONAL BREEDING. 

^^HERE is less distinction between the real 
and the conventional in matters of eti- 
quette than in almost any other distinction be- 
tween real and imitation things, for breeding 
and etiquette are the outward signs of an in- 
dividual amiability which can appear in those 
who have never heard of etiquette. 

Thus, a man who has never heard of the 
fashion of eating peas with his fork, if individu- 
ally delicate and refined, would still not put his 
knife far down into his throat. His manner cf 
feeding himself would be refined in his way, 
although not marked by a polished etiquette, 
perhaps. 

The savage, Osceola, who was brought to Wash- 
ington a prisoner, charmed everybody by the 
gentle sweetness of his manner. He was a real 
gentleman, not a conventional one. No doubt he 
ate with his fingers and wiped them on his 
blanket. He could scarcely have heard of a 



220 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

finger bowl in the Everglades. Tie had a refined 
nature, however, was full of dignity, felt a respect 
for others, and thus gained the last graee-^man - 
ner — from the teachings of Nature. 

But we have not all this interior assistance 
from our natural faculties. Most human beings 
are selfish, many are brutal ; very many are 
shame-faced, awkward, gawky. It is for the 
average human being, who is all these or one of 
these things, that manner is necessary, and for 
whom conventional etiquette was invented. 

Of course, the grand ceremonial of court is not 
real, in any sense, except that it goes to make up 
a pageant. A state dinner has many a weari- 
some detail, which must be totally absurd to a 
savage. The formal etiquette of a Spanish 
duenna, or a queen's master of ceremonies, 
would be as absurd to a Chinaman as his chop- 
sticks are inconvenient to a European. But, 
with all that, etiquette must be learned, as a 
foreign language must be learned, if we attempt 
to associate with those who practice it. 

A good story is told of Mr. Everett when Min- 
ister to England. He was spending an evening 
at the palace, and was told that he wag to play 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 221 

whist with the Duchess of Kent. He said, in a 
whisper, that he did not know whist well ; but 
the Lord Chamberlain politely bowed, and whis- 
pered, "Go through the form." He found him- 
self with three old ladies, one of whom was 
the Queen's mother, and he did go through 
the forms. He had not played long when 
he found that they knew less than ho did, so, 
with quiet tact, he played on, talking occasion- 
ally, and telling a good story, and appearing 
so suave and agreeable that forever after the 
Duchess of Kent commanded that Mr. Everett 
should play whist with her. It is a good -story, 
and reflects credit on our countryman, but what 
a picture it paints of the ennui of a royal even- 
ing, and the necessity for conventional good 
breeding. 

A man of real breeding, and with total absence 
of conventional breeding, if on the plains or in 
some out-of-the-way place, being asked to dine 
with ladies, would make himself clean and 
would dress himself as well as he could under the 
circumstances. He would perhaps come in a 
hunter's frock and flannel shirt, but he would 
have all the manners of a dress coat and white 



222 TUE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

eravat. He might not know the etiquette of the 
dinner-table, but lie would make up for it by his 
desire to be agreeable. -A man of converdionac 
breeding might come in the most careful cos- 
tume, but if ho showed contempt for his com- 
pany and his surroundings, ho would be a snob 
— no real gentleman, no matter hoy/ much ho 
knew of etiquette. 

Thus, we see that there is something better than 
mere etiquette. 

A gentleman, who is one at heart, never passes 
a lady on a staircase — at a hotel, for instance — 
without raising his hat. A lady always acknowl- 
edges such a salutation. This is real breeding. 

A conventional breeding is apt to leave this un- 
done. The mere veneering of manner which some 
Englishmen have, and which is but an excuse to 
show contempt, is not good breeding. Such men 
often deem themselves the greater gentlemen that 
they dare to behave brutally, particularly toward 
American ladies. They keep on their hats and 
stare at a lady. '•' She will know I am a nobleman 
because I am not afraid to do this thing," has 
been the mental reservation of many such a 
'• gentleman/' 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 223 

An English attache, accustomed from his birth 
to the best society, once accepted a lady's invita- 
tion to accompany her to some teas in New 
York. He had brought letters to her, and she 
felt obliged to pay him this attention. She named 
an hour when he was to be at her house, and she 
took him thence to some of the best houses in 
New York. He amused himself by singing in the 
carriage and by sucking the head of his cane. As 
she was a lady she could not show by her manner 
that she was disgusted, but took him where she 
had promised, and then drove homo. When they 
readied her door her footman rang the bell, and 
the young Englishman walked up to the door 
with her. 

"I say — aw — I say — I've had — an awfully nice 
time— aw. Let's go together again — aw — some 
day — don't you know— aw ?" 

" No," said the lady, bowing and entering her 
own door. " I fear that your musical repertory is 
exhausted. Good-morning. ' ' 

Afterward, this snubbed individual — a conven- 
tional but not a real gentleman — tried to apolo- 
gize: 

"I — aw—didn't know — aw — don't you know— 



2ii THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

aw — that you'd mind my singing — over here — aw 
— don't you know — aw — thought you were pretty 
free and easy, aw." 

" Would you have done it at home and in the 
company of a duchess ?" said the lady. 

"Aw — no — duchesses — don't you see — awful 
swell — don't you know." 

l i Remember, then, hereafter," said the lady, 
"that all American women arc duchesses, and 
must bo treated according to their rank. ' ' 

One thing this gentleman did know, and that 
was that it was proper to sit opposite to the lady 
in her carriage, and not by her side, for which 
piece of conventional good breeding she mentally 
thanked him. Of this one piece of respect she 
says that he knew how to behave himself. He 
was intentionally rude and careless about the 
singing. 

In foreign cities, if a traveler is invited to din- 
ner and has not the proper costume with him in 
which to attend a dinner, he writes to his host, 
excusing himself on that score. If he receives 
another note, saying " We will gladly receive you 
en costume devoyageur" the gentleman or lady can 
go ; but without this explanation the presence of 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 225 

a person not properly dressed for a dinner would 
be considered an insult. 

A few years ago sonic young Englishmen of high 
rank arrived at Nahant in very careless costume- 
sent their cards and letters of introduction to Mr. 
Longfellow, and were immediately invited to a 
seven o'clock dinner. They accepted, and came 
in their shooting coats and with telescopes hang- 
ing around their necks. 

Mr. Longfellow had invited some distinguished 
Boston people to meet them, all of whom were in 
proper evening dress, of course. The young men 
endeavored "to hluli it oil," as the poet care- 
fully scanned their appearance, "by saying. " We're 
hero for shooting, you know," etc., etc. 

" And do you shoot with your telescopes ?" re- 
marked Mr. Longfellow. 

If they had written to Mr. Longfellow before 
dinner, and had explained their not having their 
luggage with them, and had left their telescopes 
at home, no one would have thought it rude. It 
was the assumption that they could do such a 
ining with impunity in America that was rude. 

An American lady of fashion was traveling in 
Europe, and happened to arrive in Florence 



226 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

without her luggage, Her friend, the Minister, 
osked her to dinner to meet a great lady of the 
court. 

" But I have no dresses," said the lady ; " one 
plain black silk is all I can possibly achieve." 

" Oh !" said he, "that is all right.; I will ex- 
plain to those ladies whom you are to meet." 

When the lady went to the dinner, which was 
very elegant, ail the men were in dress coats, 
orders, ribbons, white ties, and the para- 
phernalia of masculine full dress She was 
astonished to see all the ladies as plainly 
dressed as herself. The Minister having 
explained her dilemma to them, they were 
all plainly dressed too. They were women who 
generally wore at dinners jewels of fabulous 
value, and always considered it de rigiieur to 
wear neck and arms bare, ?.nd to cover them- 
selves with lace. 

But it was both real and conventional etiquette 
for them to thus meet the American lady who 
had not her toilettes w T lth her. Although she 
regretted not seeing their splendid dresses, she 
could not but be touched by this act. They 
knew that she was a person of consideration 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 227 

at home, and they treated her to the "best and 
kindest in their power by dressing so plainly that 
she did not feel her black silk to be a blot on the 
dinner. 

Etiquette changes with each successive age. 
A few years ago we should*- have said that it 
would not be proper for people to talk slang at 
an elegant dinner. Now we hear ' i awfully j oily, ' ' 
" immensely pretty," u awfully mean," " rum- 
looking chap," from delicate lips at the most 
recherche entertainments. It cannot be defended. 
It is far worse than the stilted grandiloquence of 
our grandparents, because that was at least 
respectful. It now would sound very stilted and 
foolish, no doubt, but it would be less startling 
than the phrases which a conventional etiquette 
allows. 

Young men, particularly English young men, 
permit themselves an ease of manner which is 
almost rudeness sometimes. A young man who 
takes his foot in his lap, and pulls up his stock- 
ing, and nurses his leg, and lolls, and evidently 
brings the manners of the stable into the dining- 
room, is no real gentleman, although his title 
may be that of Duke of Devonshire. A scholar 



228 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

who is awkward but respectful, whose manners 
betray, perhaps, original eccentricity, and who is 
unaccustomed to the etiquette of a fashionable 
table, still is a real gentleman, and the moment 
he begins to talk will announce himself as such. 

A lady who prefers a fast reputation will often 
sit with her legs crossed, lean back in her chair, 
twirl her fan, show her hostess that she does not 
care for her, and talk loud or not at all, as the 
mood takes her. Some well-born young married 
women in New York think that incivility marks 
their importance. These women are accorded a 
place because they are well-born and well-married, 
and have money, but they are neither real nor 
yet conventional ladies, for a lady always has 
good manners, or cultivates what she believes to 
be such. 

The real gentleman is careful never to let 
his breath offend. After smoking he should 
retire and rinse his mouth with cologne and 
water, for the breath of a smoker, particularly 
after drinking wine and spirits, is apt to be dis- 
gusting. After drinking, and eating a dinner in 
which the " forbidden fruit " (as some one called 
onions) has been indulged in, even though they 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS, 220 

were concealed in Delmonico's "best cookery, a 
man should retire with the rose-water finger 
bowl, or the result is dreadful. No slight im- 
pression of this kind is lost upon women, nor are 
they ever deceived by cachous or cardamom 
seeds. "An ounce of prevention is worth a 
pound of cure" — cleanliness is next to Godliness. 

Artificial observances have this merit, that they 
keep out of good society those independent be- 
ings who insist on their rights as reformers 
against what they consider as the " effete man- 
ners of society." Such men take pleasure in 
dirty linen, unbrushed coats, unclean shoes and 
dirty hands. They offend every sense, and yet 
some of them are in high places. If a man is 
marked in this way, people know enough not to 
invite him to dinner, and he soon finds out that 
he loses more than he gains. 

There is no such selfishness or rudeness as to 
impose inelegant manners and adverse opinions 
upon the company to which you are invited. A 
man who advances atheistical opinions, or any 
other system of thought which shocks his host 
and hostess, is no gentleman. 



280 THE AMERICAN CODE OE MANNERS. 

CHAPTER XYIII. 

THE ETHICS OF DRESS. 



"AS costly your habit as your purse can 

J~\ buy," was the worldly-wise advice of old 
Polonius to his son when he was to leave home 
for foreign travel. 

It speaks not only for the worldly wisdom of 
the venerable courtier, but it also tells the modern 
reader of that demand for costume which was 
cnce so much the necessity of courts, but which; 
so far as men are concerned, is now almost passed 
away. 

Did Mercutio now start on his travels he 
would find one small portmanteau enough for his 
needs, and he could not, if he would, wear more 
than a plain black dress suit at any court, unless 
he entered the military service, when he would 
wear a uniform. 

However, much has been left off the dress of 
men to be put on to women. Every woman now 
dresses as if she were a queen. The short reign 
of the Empress Eugenie effected a profound 
change in the female dress of the world. The 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 231 

luxury, variety and splendor which has entered 
into the composition of female attire since her 
advent is enormous. 

Women read once of the great luxury of Queen 
Elizabeth and wondered. They have now but to 
look at the trousseau of a modern bride and see 
a luxury of which Queen Elizabeth never dreamed. 

For the trousseau must contain twelve dozen 
of everything, all the underclothing must be 
trimmed with costly Valenciennes, and the 
twelve dozen is an infallible rule. 

Queen Bess had brocades and jewels, of course, 
in plenty, but her under linen was scanty. She 
had two pairs of silk stockings (they were only 
just invented then). A modern belle has twelve 
dozen silken hose of every color of the rainbow. 

The boots, shoes and slippers of a modern belle 
would have astonished Queen Bess — they are 
so pretty, so various and so expensive ; they fit 
the foot much better, too, than the clumsy slipper 
of the past. 

There is no doubt but that the American 
women dress too much. They have no limit in 
the matter of expense, for an American husband, 
if he has money, stops at no expense. In 



232 TIIE AMERICAN CODE UE MANNERS. 

Europe, where duchesses, trusting to old lace 
and jewels, are often extremely shabby as to 
their gowns, not caring a pin Yviiat anybody says, 
the American woman is conspicuously well- 
dressed, generally much fresher than the duchess. 

Worth says that the American women are the 
best customers he has — far better than queens. 
They ask the price ; American women never do. 
They simply say : ' ' Give me the best, the most 
beautiful, the most fashionable gown/' 

It is all very well if the lady can pay for it. 
" Costly your habit as your purse can buy." But 
it sometimes happens that it is not in her power 
to pay. Hence the great trouble, the defalcations 
and the sorrowful story of dishonor. 

Beautiful dress is all very fine. Every one likes 
to see a woman well-dressed ; but the ethics of 
dress should be consulted. Is it worth all that it 
costs, in trouble, expense, heartburning, and 
every other most painful effort, besides leading 
to criminal extravagance? Would not the 
fashion be improved by plainness, simplicity 
and cheapness ? 

The fact that costume has disappeared all over 
Europe is a great loss to the painter, and the re- 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 233 

flection arises — how much better would it be if 
every one had a costume, as in the Middle Ages ! 
How beautiful was then the dress of the cftan- 
oinesse, the middle aged woman with her coif, 
the maiden with her snood, the young married 
woman with her veil. And these dresses were so 
becoming. The manufacture of them was so easy, 
too ; the patterns were used from year to year. 
There were tailors for women as for men. The ma- 
terials were good ; they lasted from year to year. 

Now what modern lady does not dread the hour 
with her dressmaker. The certainty that her 
dress will be too tight across the chest and too 
loose around the waist It is not certain to be 
stylish, either, and then material and ail is wasted. 
What a trouble, too, to have the necessity of going 
several times a week, and to be put off by a 
pampered dressmaker, and told to come — another 
time ! 

Yet every woman struggles with this evil every 
spring and fall, and emerges always the worse for 
the conflict. 

No wonder women wish for " Ladies' Co-opera- 
tive Dress Associations," which, if they could be 
accomplished without fraud, would be admirable 



234 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNEES. 

things, and which would be an excellent check 
upon the abominable fraud, insolence and dis- 
honesty of the fashionable dressmaker. 

There is probably no such story in any litera- 
ture of the insolence of the " pampered menial " 
as that of the New York dressmaker. 

Mostly Irish women who have once been cham- 
bermaids, they have, by the weak indulgence of 
some women who call themselves ladies, become a 
power in the land. Having the costume in one 
hand and the lady in the other, they present the 
nursery spectacle of the naughty child who is 
reaching for the forbidden tart which Jane holds 
just above the urchin's reach. It is no longer 
the respectful seamstress working for her bread, 
but a half -drunken Irish or French woman dic- 
tating terms to her lady customer. 

" My husband is waiting for me to go out in 
his dog-cart, so I must call my forewoman to 
finish this dress," remarked one of these imperti- 
nent artistes to a lady once whom she was fitting. 
We are glad to record that this woman afterwards 
failed. 

The lady is entirely in the hands of the dress- 
maker, financially. The modiste may cut up and 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 235 

ruin a rich velvet, the laxly has no redress. She 
may charge twice too much, and yet the lady 
cannot complain. The law in this land of liberty 
is always on the side of the workwoman or man. 
If a brutal carman runs into a lady's coupe, the 
courts give damages to the carman. It is a part 
of the mistake of universal suffrage. 

Such being some of the troubles of dressmaking 
as done outside of one's house, no wonder that 
many ladies try the business of having the work 
done at home, which, while it saves material 
and one sort of trouble, adds on much trouble 
of another sort, in the incessant demands 
of the seamstress for more buttons, twist, tape, 
lining and " trimming." No modern seamstress 
ever had enough of these, and many a lady, 
having tried the ^ woman in the house," 
who is always complaining of her accommoda- 
tions, her tea and her dinner, gives up that sort 
of annoyance and buys seme patterns and sits 
down and makes a plain dress herself. 

But a lady cannot do everything. She has her 
house, her children, her improvement, her read- 
ing, her charities and her societies to attend to. 
She is not able to sew much. 



236 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

Where shall she go ? what shall she do to get 
her dresses ready for the season ? 

No wonder she sends to France, where all this 
thing is simplified, and where she gets good 
material, a good fit and stylish clothes for 
half the money which these things cost in New 
York. 

Etiquette demands that a lady, if she visit at 
all, be handsomely dressed. There is a growing 
taste for plain clothes, that is to say, dark velvets 
and furs, black or dark silks, and an absence 
of garish display in the daytime. Few American 
women dress too much in the street now. But 
the velvet, or the silk, must be made by an 
artist, the bonnet must be a chef cfoeuvre, and 
the gloves and boots must be marvelously per- 
fect. The glove must be a long-sleeved one, or 
else have ten or eighteen buttons. 

Women who dare, through eccentricity or 
avarice, to go about with dirty or ragged gowns 
are universally disliked. They profane society 
with their presence. For etiquette demands that 
each woman be at least neat, 

" St'U to be neat, still to be dressed, 
As if waiting for a feast," 



TIIE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 23? 

is the characteristic of most ladies, but there arc 
some who are so conceited as to believe that they 
can go to a ball in a costume which has seen its 
best days, and to carry all off by a certain 
audacity. 

Such women should be frowned down. 
Dress was made to dignify the human body. In 
our social intercourse we wish to appear at our 
best, and etiquette is the code of laws made by 
the society of all ages for the benefit of such as 
enter its portals. 

It is in England a sort of understood law that 
women should appear at dinners in low-necked 
dresses, with short sleeves. The dress at court 
is always prescribed. We have no court, and so 
every lady does as she pleases. It is to be re- 
corded, however, in favor of American ladies, 
that they generally contrive, with all their disad- 
vantages of impertinent dressmakers and no 
codo of dress, to be the best-dressed women in 
the world ; they have beauty, taste and neatness 
— three important codicils. 

One thing, however, is apt to be mistaken in 
the American ethical code of dress. 

Elderly women dress too young. The flaxen- 



238 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

wigged Mrs. Skewton of Dickens has too many 
followers among ns. Women of fifty, with skinny 
arms and hollow cheeks, painted and dressed as 
young girls — these are our failures. No woman 
but looks older for this style of dress. To look 
one's age, to dress appropriately, a woman should 
always be a little ahead of time and not behind 
it. 

A woman who attempts to appear younger or 
more fascinating than she is should remember the 
fable of the ox who strove to gambol like the 
gazelle and who received the reproof of Jupiter. 
Mere talent should never try to copy genius, nor 
should a mature woman try to look like a young 
one. Fascination is a gift of the gods. 

Truly fascinating women have no need of effort 
to appear what they are not, either youn^ or old. 
They are not called on to trumpet their own 
charms or conquests, nor to touch themselves up 
like an old pastel. The world will give them 
credit ; men will kneel to them. Every one gives 
them a courteous adoration. They know by in- 
tuition how to dress, how to conduct themselves. 
" I find myself adoring beautiful, calm 
women who cannot be flirted with," said 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 239 

Lord Byron, the man most adored by wo- 
men. Our spring beauties are so fresh and 
lovely in America, that it seems a pity that 
they should ever journey down to the patches 
and powders of a French Marquise. These co- 
quettish and gentle, delicate and smiling young 
American girls know how to dress themselves. 
They have the intuition of the toilette. Their 
only present danger is in getting too mannish, 
what with their brother's ulsters, their hats and 
gauntlets, and sometimes, alas ! their brother's 
manners, so that you do not know which is which. 
The ethics of dress, which should express sex, is 
sometimes confusing. 

Some wit said that the principal charm of a 
poke bonnet was that it is so essentially feminine 
no man could ever have worn one. 

The early Puritan dress was very becoming and 
very lovable. The Puritan fathers could not 
banish love nor woman's grace with all their 
hard creed. Girls would be born and would be 
lovable. 

Sometimes Fate played them strange tricks, and 
a marquise in disguise— a real court lady, all 
smiles and coquetry— would come dancing in with 



240 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

fairy feet, with eyes bright as diamonds, and lips 
like strawberries all smothered in cream, and 
with curls that fluttered in the breeze — these 
witches would come to Salem town and confound 
the fathers. What capricious mermaids always 
landed at Newport, for instance, even in these 
early days, and we read that they did not patron- 
ize the Puritan dress, but sent to Francre for a 
" slip of rose paduasoy, with Brussels lappets, and 
high-heeled shoes with buckles." 

The ethics of dress demand that a mother 
should always dress better than her daughter. 

The mother's dress should be of more costly 
material, and should be thoroughly suited to 
her age, complexion and style. Some American 
mothers go shabby and put fine clothes on their 
daughters. The mother should wear all the 
jewelry. The mother should be in velvet, silk 
and satin ; the daughter in muslin, percale or 
cashmere. 

The modern fashion of dressing young girls in 
satin and velvet is a poor one. It leaves them 
nothing to look forward to. 

Young girls need no aid from the becoming 
light of jewelry. They arc rubies, diamonds. 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 24i 

pearls themselves. Let them save those adven- 
titious aids for the days which will surely come — 
the days when the eye loses its brilliancy and the 
teeth their pearly charm. Then jewels are be- 
coming and fit the needs of maturity. 

To allow the hair to grow white is one of the 
allowable coquetries of middle life. It is so be- 
coming that a woman is to be forgiven if she 
blanches it a little as it grows iron-gray. It is 
the only hair dye which cannot be condemned , 
that which assists gray hair to grow into white 
floss silk. 



243 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

CHAPTER XIX. 

AN AMERICAN RETURNED FROM EUROPE, 

THERE is one part of his luggage which em 
American should never leave in Europe, 
and that is — his nationality. 

It too often happens that this is just what he dors 
leave, and there hav T e been weak Americans who 
have come home from Europe with "but slight 
knowledge of their own language after a six 
months' absence. 

Americano are sometimes very much impressed 
with England, and come home so heavily plated 
that they are called Britannia ware. Others get a 
smattering of German, and can listen to nothing 
but German music, and smoke German pipes and 
raise a German beard. 

Others are smitten with everything French, 
and are constantly larding their talk with con- 
venient French phrases, are considerably dis- 
turbed in their belief in women, and are not at 
all sure of their belief in anything. 

These are new, green travelers, and this is a 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 243 

disease, like the measles or the whooping-cough, 
peculiar to youth. 

The old traveler, the" picked man of coun- 
tries," knows that there is nothing like home, 
and that a person, to have any consideration in this 
world, must derive it from the spot of his birth. 

We have, as a people, a singular inaptitude to 
take root in Europe. Europeans come here, and 
make excellent citizens, but Americans seem 
always to remain colonists in Europe. They 
rarely become part of the body politic. The tide 
of immigration is this way. No American can 
live long in Paris without feeling that he has lost 
something of consequence and of the feeling of 
citizenship. 

To come home thus discontented and uprooted 
is to be a person without a country, that most 
wretched of waifs. 

To come home, bringing only affectations and 
the poorer part of Europe, is to be even worse — 
an unworthy citizen. 

, To come home loving one's own country better, 
and to add to its newness all that he can bring of 
European art, culture and refinement, is to be the 
truly good citizen and the accomplished traveler. 



244 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

No doubt there is much in the polished eti- 
quette of the high society in Europe which is 
very grateful to Americans, particularly to 
women. They like ceremony, politeness and 
deference ; they like the service, so easy and so 
marked ; they like the definiteness of European 
etiquette, and they like the state and form — the 
elegance, in fact. 

The very manners of servants and of shopkeep- 
ers, of couriers and of maids, are all so much 
more respectful than anything on this side that 
they feel, for the first time, what it is to be a lady. 

Then the forms and ceremonies of a court arc 
amusing until one gets tired of them. The ne- 
cessity of a certain dress at a certain ceremonial, 
all this corrects that dreadful uncertainty which 
exists always with us. 

What shall we wear? In Europe we always 
know what we ought to wear. 

The question of liveries, here always a most 
perplexing question, is in Europe settled for one 
by his tailor. 

No wonder that some Americans come home 
spoiled, and commit a thousand absurdities. We 
are none of us any too wise. It seems as if Europe 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 245 

sometimes took away what little sense we 
originally had. 

Men sometimes come home dressed in so pro- 
nounced an English style that everybody laughs. 

They should read the description of Beau Brum- 
mel : 

- " He was always studiously and remarkably 
well-dressed, never outre, and although consider- 
able time and attention were directed to his toi- 
lette, it never, when accomplished, seemed to 
occupy his attention. His manners were easy, 
polished, gentlemanlike, stamped with what St. 
Simon would call I 'usage du mondeet du 2ihcs grand, 
et du meilleur. His dress was the general model, 
and when he had struck out a new idea he would 
smile at observing its gradual progress, adopted 
by the highest as well as the lowest classes." 

A man to be thoroughly well-dressed should be 
dressed so that no one can tell wmat he has on. 

It is a pity that the nineteenth century has 
drawn so severe a model for the dress of men, but 
so it is. 

An American returned from Europe should not 
abuse his own country ; he should not complain 
of ennui or disgust. If he feels discontented 



246 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

here he should keep it to himself ; for ail 
travelers know that there is no country where 
daily life is so comfortable for almost any well- 
to-do individual as in America. 

New York has an air of Men etre about it which 
few cities possess. The great benefits of gas and 
of hot and cold water are not so common as with 
us in any European city. Ice water is not obtain- 
able in Europe unless one pays for it heavily ; 
and as for the markets, no city in the world has 
such a one as New York. 

In traveling in Europe one is always harassed 
and hampered by his trunks. In America a 
check saves all the trouble. 

So there are advantages and disadvantages 
everywhere. The American in Europe has every- 
thing to see which can fascinate him. The tri- 
umphs of Architecture, of Time, of Wealth, of 
Art, are there, and of Nature, in Switzerland, we 
have nothing like that here. We have no Rome, 
no London and no Paris ; we have not the 
IJhine with its castles. 

« But we have our duty to our own soil, and we do 
think, read and work, let us hope, for one end : 
that we may bring home to our own land all the 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 247 

rectified impressions, and none of the exaggerated 
ones. 

Especially is the American to be warned against 
an affected habit of speech. To try to talk like 
an Englishman is an affectation always detected. 
To find French more easy than American is a 
most transparent Immbug. 

We always laugh at the mistakes of foreigners 
when they blunder in English ; but they, for- 
tunately, never laugh at ours. 1 f they did, what a 
perpetual fund of amusement we could afford 
them. 

The apeing of foreign manners affords the 
English comedian fund for the manufacture of 
many good comedies, and we have no better 
satirist than Cowper, who said quaintly : 

" How much a fool, who hath been sent to Rome, 
Exceeds a fool who only staid at home !" 

The snob is a very detestable creature, and the 
snob who pretends to be ashamed of his own 
country is the worst snob in the world. 

Americans have often an excess of patriotism, 
which is called "spread-eagleism." This is in 
bad taste, no doubt, and many a " Yankee " has 



248 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

made himself absurd in England by talking of 
the stars and stripes. No one should parade the 
excellencies of his country any more than he 
should boast of the excellencies of his wife, rela 
va sans dire, but the failing is a more excusable 
one than the reverse. To see Or hear a man 
run down his own country is to despise him at 
once. 

An American at home, if he has led a useful and 
industrious life, is a nobleman — as good as any- 
body. Abroad he can never have the same con- 
sideration. He must always be, unless he has a 
diplomatic position, somewhat at a disadvantage 
in Europe. Some few Americans, by their talents, 
have taken very high position in Europe, but they 
are rare. 

A traveled American, home from Europe, 
can have a great influence for the good of his 
countrymen. 

lie can, in many ways, improve every one in 
his neighborhood. He can gently and quietly 
bring about a greater attention to etiquette ; he 
can show his friends how to give a dinner in the 
English style, which is the best style ; he can show 
the advantage of a quiet livery, a well-organized 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 249 

band of servants — always a difficult thing to bring 
about in America. 

We cannot, with a republican form of govern- 
ment, ever hope to have good servants. An 
American citizen makes this mistake : if he is a 
poor man he is ashamed to be a servant ; he 
thinks it degrades him. It is his mistake, but the 
mistake exists. 

He thinks that he is a better man, a greater 
man, if, in a condition of servitude, which his 
pocket may compel, he is then impertinent and 
disobedient. 

The Irishman who waits at a dinner may live 
to eat off the plate which he has lately washed. 

All of which ruins the hope of good service— 
a fact as unfortunate for the w T aiter as for the 
employer. 

For all cannot or do not rise, but the hope that 
they ivill, makes them all discontented. 

We see all over the world this connection be- 
tween little and great things. It would be easy 
to show, as Emerson says, "of many fine things 
in the world — in the customs of nations, the 
etiquette of courts, the constitution of govern- 
ments—the origin in quite simple local neces- 



250 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

sities. Heraldry, for example, and the cere- 
monies of a coronation, are a dignified repetition 
of the occurrences that might befall a dragoon 
and his footboy." 

So the question of good service in the United 
States is forever injured and disturbed by the 
great instrument of our liberties, known as the 
Declaration of Independence. 

Far more dignified and aristocratic was the act 
of an Italian marquis with a long old title, 
who, finding himself poor and friendless, went to 
Delmonico and let himself out as a waiter, and, 
until he could better his condition, performed 
those services well. He knew his own standing 
too well to be ashamed of serving — 

44 He also serves, who only stands and waits." 

Yes, he serves at the great counter cf Duty, and 
at that work nothing disgraces one but doing his 
work badly, and in an evil spirit. 

Every American who brings home from Europe 
fine statues, pictures, old china, or appropriate 
furniture, is aiding his country to grow better and 
more refined. For art elevates a nation. The pos- 
session of the treasures gathered in the Palace of 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 251 

the Demidoffs, if brought here, will be a liberal 
education to every untraveled American, to every 
artisan. The great Exposition of 1876 was the 
most admirable education to all our people. 

Music, eloquence, poetry, painting, sculpture 
and architecture, all are of the fine arts. Of the 
first we already begin to take a proud place 
among the nations. The Americans are a musical 
people, but still must go to European conser- 
vatories to study. Of sculpture we may also 
claim some recognition. Of poetry and painting, 
particularly of landscape painting, we have some 
hold ; but in architecture we are terribly behind 
hand. Every American's eye suffers from the 
windows of New York when he first lands. The 
American who travels to the end that he may 
build better when he comes home, travels wisely. 

Of eloquence we have our share — perhaps too 
much. The Americans are glib talkers. They 
have the gift of the gab. If, in traveling, they 
learned to think more and to talk less, perhaps it 
would be just as well. 

Another thing might be learned in Europe, and 
that is to not be ashamed of, a judicious economy. 

We are said to be the ruin of Europe with our 



25Z THE AMERICAN (ODE OE MANNERS. 

extravagance. No European is ashamed to be 

poor, or to say "I cannot afford it." All Ameri- 
cans were once ashamed to say this, because they 
thought it reflected dishonor upon them ; and 
almost any American would rather pay a dis- 
honest charge than to dispute it. Few, if any, 
Americans would take the trouble which Mr. 
Cobden did in New York, to give a whole day to 
the bringing to justice of a cabman who charged 
him too much ; and yet how much better would 
our laws be observed if that were the practice of 
every American. 

Americans returned from Europe have the 
greatest future before them, if they will patrioti- 
cally devote themselves to the righting of wrongs 
and to the correcting of abuses. 

Much in our great country goes by default. We 
are all taking things very easily as to the adminis- 
tration of the laws. Our cities show, by the dread- 
ful disorder and peculation which this want of es- 
pionage has brought about, how unwise a plan it is. 

Let us, therefore, copy that part of European 
civilization which tends to wise economy, judi- 
cious surveillance, and to polished manners and 
refined lives, without affectation. 



THE AMERICAN CODE OE MANNERS. 253 

CHAPTER XX. 

THE MONEY MARRIAGE MARKET. 

THERE are many calculating Romeos in this 
world — men who are looking for a rich 
wife as a means to an honest living. Work 
they despise. They are often most gentlemanly 
men, and will never do anything mean. They 
may make as good husbands as others ; still, 
the world d^es not adore them, nor do the poets 
write of them as they do Of Romeo, pw?' et simple. 
No one has imagined them as saying : 

" O cruel Love ! How great a power is thine ! 
Under the Poles although we lie, 
Thou mak'st us fry ; 
And thou canst make us freeze beneath the Line." 

No such impassioned heat disturbs these young 
gentlemen. They are very cool — very cool. 

Heiresses, therefore, become very much at- 
tended to in society. Their rent-roll is discussed, 
and is ascertained to a nicety. They are some- 
times injured by this fact, and are induced to 



254 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

remain unmarried because they fear that they 
shall be married solely for their money. 

Others marry men who have been Avon princi- 
pally by fortune, but who have a real character, 
and who determine to repay the money obligation 
by a life of devotion. These matches are often 
very happy. 

Others marry mere adventurers, who use their 
wives' money for their own pleasure, and neglect 
and insult the women who have benefitted them. 

The etiquette of marriage should be as formal 
and as studied as that of other recognized insti- 
tutions. If a man marries a woman for her 
money, he should never let her suspect it. He 
should be studiously attentive and kind. Indeed, 
much should be urged upon even loving hus- 
bands, who support their wives handsomely, in 
regard to the manners of every day. Married 
people should never let familiarity breed con- 
tempt. 

The most calculating people in the world, the 
French, who marry their children to each other 
without speaking of love, demand that one party 
shall bring as much as the other to the common 
fund. Indeed, if the money question comes in* 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 255 

that would seem to be the best and most honest 
arrangement, not allow an impecunious man to 
be wholly supported by a rich woman. Young men 
who have large fortunes are, in iheir turn, also the 
prey of women fortune-hunters. Every watering 
place has its managing mamma, who is looking 
out for the coming millionaire. Every one who 
is not in the game sees all the lures and all the 
snares. There is no such hunting over " brush, 
brook and brae" as that of a mamma with 
marriageable daughters, who has sighted a 
"rich young man;" and, to do them justice, 
the daughters supplement their honored parent 
well. Marriage has become a money mar- 
ket, a stock exchange, a means to an end — too 
much. 

But if a marriage of interest is made, how soon 
the inevitable married flirtation begins to crop 
out — how the young husband, having married 
a woman whom he cannot love, begins to be 
attentive to some one else. 

This seems to be the false etiquette of the age, 
partly borrowed from French novels. 

It is, therefore, delightful to all unsophisticated 
humans to see the young lover really in love, and 



236 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

to see interest disappear, and unselfish affection 
take its place. 

But a young engaged couple, however much in 
love, should not make their feelings too manifest 
— in public, at least. They should remember that 
people are observing them ; for, if on a stage- 
coach drive, a picnic, or lawn tennis party, or 
other occasions where many young people are 
congregated, they seem too devoted to each 
other, the general pleasure of the party is lost. 

The marriage money market is most vigorous 
in large cities, where an heiress rarely gets 
through her first winter. The pursuit is some- 
times disgusting, but the " end justifies the 
means ;" such, at least, is the worldly maxim. 

But even in this worldly and selfish world there 
should be an etiquette. ' ' There is a becoming 
'ton' in everything, even in religion," says a 
modern author. '* One of the most important 
points in life is decency, which is to do what is 
proper, and when it is proper," says Lord 
Chesterfield. 

A man, to enter the matrimonial money market, 
must be a gilded Turvcydrop— all deportment. 
He must appear to be all that is good, proper', 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 257 

and very deferential. If he has claims to an 
exalted social position, let him air them well. 
Let him assure the lady's family, by every means 
in his power, that generally he looks down upon 
them. He should utter only vague common- 
places. He must efface himself. Nothing passes 
so current in society as " conversational inanities 
and fossil facts, well polished into inexpressive 
smoothness*" Beware of saying anything origi- 
nal-it might lead one into trouble. If he can 
simulate a passion for the young lady, so much 
the better. If he cannot, a lofty superiority, and 
an air of giving them the best article of a hus- 
band that they can buy for their money, has 
assuaged many a vulgar family who need posi- 
tion and are willing to pay for it. 

But if it is disgraceful and degrading to see a 
man marrying for money, simply, it is more 
degrading to behold a woman willing to sacrifice 
all that a woman should hold most dear to obtain 
what money can buy. How many a woman do 
we see dragging around a rich, vulgar husband, 
who is merely an appendage to her diamonds? 
How many an educated woman blushes for her 
husband's grammar? Who shall portray the 



258 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

more than Spartan endurance with which these 
women hide the vulture, despair, which is preying 
on their vitals ; ' ' with what pardonable artifice will 
they blandly smile a smile like that of St. Agnes at 
the stake, or like the sunshine on an overflowing 
volcano." The sufferings of women who have 
married uncongenial men would fill a volume. 

The English aristocracy is full of this sort of 
thing. A pretty, portionless high-born Lady Sarah 
must marry money ; so, some little red-faced, 
bouncing, violent, vulgar John Bull, with much 
money and splendid diamonds, comes about, 
to enjoy having the dowager thrust her elegant 
girl under his dreadful little nose. 

The result shows itself in the queer, dis- 
torted, ungainly children which are born of such 
a union. Nature has its rights, which will not 
submit to be violated. Money can buy much, 
but it cannot buy everything. 

American etiquette has hardly reached this 
point, although many parents do force their 
daughters to marry men, whom they do not love, 
because they have money. 

Elegant mammas will call drunkenness "high 
spirits," vulgarity bonhommie, and licentious- 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 259 

ness "the sowing of wild oats " — if a man has a 
great deal of money. 

There is no such a golden glass to look 
through, it transmutes everything into virtue — 
the possession of money. That ever outcropping 
Pharisaism, which is the so-called specialty of 
the Anglo-Saxon race, displays itself in the mar- 
riage money market eminently. 

However, all is not gold that glitters, and some- 
times the money disappears and the marriage 
remains. Then the husband is in a sorry fix. He 
must work or starve, and sometimes he finds that 
the wife whom he has married for money is no 
helpmeet to a poor man. 

A man who is married for his money, and is 
found to have none, is a still greater burden ; for 
very few men who have possessed a fortune 
from childhood can, if they lose it, make another. 
It is the man whose energies have been stimu- 
lated by necessity who makes the fortune, and, if 
that is lost, can make another. There is nothing 
so admirable as that Dame, Necessity. She is a 
good teacher for the young. 

But all rich marriages are not unhappy. Rich 
people of both sexes have hearts, and can make 



2G0 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

sood marriages and be happy ever after. Let 
"love go before like a light in the pathway," 
and then — no matter which has the money. It is 
a very good thing to have, if it is not the only 
attraction. And there is a positive moral obliga- 
tion against an improvident marriage for a couple 
who have been gently reared ; they should not 
marry without money. 

There always should be a " shot in the locker" 
against a rainy day, against prolonged illness, 
against children's needs, their education and 
clothing. Well-bred, poor married people suffer 
untold tortures in not being able to educate their 
children according to their rank in life. That 
has been one of the many dreadful consequences 
of our late civil war to the South. A whole 
generation of children have grown up without 
the proper education, and with no perceptible 
future. 

It is not strange that parents who have felt the 
evils of poverty are anxAus that their children 
should make rich marriages. There is no want 
so perceptible to maturity as that of money. It 
is, in its way, everything ; but parents who have 
married for love should not ignore or forget their 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 261 

own early happiness, nor the stron~ attractions 
which brought them together. 

Although a man who has married for money 
may have a social pre-eminence or while, there 
is a class to whom he always looks up, and whom 
he must always feel does not entirely respect him. 
Those are the hard-working, successful profes- 
sional or mercantile men who have made their 
own way. There is much that is very disadvan- 
tageous and humiliating in the contrast of the 
fat, sleek and lazy horse and the full-blooded, 
high-mettled racer. There is no such admiration 
felt by mankind for the man who is simply fortu- 
nate, as for him who deserves fortune. 

As for the life of a young man who makes a 
show for a few years that he may marry an 
heiress, nothing is so contemptible. He lives a 
purely selfish existence— he is a mere cumberer 
of the ground. To be the accomplished man 
of society, he may cultivate a few gifts 
and graces, but he has no true manhood. He 
may be a convenient man to ask to dinner, an 
eminent club favorite ; must put down a hand- 
some contribution to every ball list and every 
fashionable charity he must send good bouquets 



262 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

and be well mounted at the hunt ; he must be 
one of those colorless, civil, useful nonentities 
whom society loves ; he must have no disagree- 
able, trying family alliances. He will thus be 
asked where the heiresses go. He must be seen 
at every tea, ball, reception ; he must give an 
occasional theatre ;*arty, and leave out all the 
people who have been civil to him, only inviting 
those of the highest fashion, who have snubbed 
him. He will thus be spoken of as a young man 
of excellent manners. 

He must have that air of cold-blooded ingrati- 
tude which none but real snobs know, and an 
air of not seeing those who have been kind to 
him in the past. He must let the lady who was 
a friend to him in his youth find a seat, if she can ; 
but, if Miss Sunball enters the room, he must' get 
her a seat at any cost. 

He must do the opulent bachelor business for 
awhile, and adopt the paralytic crutch-and-tooth- 
pick style ; he must fill his rooms with brlc-d-brac 
and Eastlake furniture, and give very recherche 
little suppers. 

But, if he wants an heiress who knows the 
value of her money, he must not appear to be 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 263 

fast or dissipated ; he must at least seem very 
respectable. 

If he marries a third-rate heiress, with a loud 
and dreadful style, he will be perpetually shocked. 
She will dress beautifully, but she will talk slang, 
be cheek by jowl with all the second-rate men, 
and probably take him to Europe, flirt with her 
courier, and then elope with a French marquis 
who turns out to be a barber. 

The worldly woman who determines to marry 
for money is often a sort of robber baroness for 
sallying forth from her castle armed to destroy. 
The world is her oyster. If her husband prove 
generous, she may live with him ; if he is not, she 
soon finds out an excuse to leave him. Such 
women never feel deeply or passionately ; they 
are social chameleons, taking the color of the 
times ; they are full of subserviency to those who 
are high in place and power. She reins in her 
splendid bays at. the great house, but she does 
not stop to leave a blanket at the cottage. " She 
plays her part in Fortune's pageant, and plays it 
well;" but woe be unto the lame child who is 
born to her. 

Some of these worldly women who enter the 



204 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

money market are butchers in disguise. They 
are Neros, Caligulas : ferocity toward all her 
rivals ; egotism and selfishness toward the man 
whose money she is spending. She is a tigress 
who eats her victim while he is still alive. She 
flirts and enjoys her life. He may suffer and be 
still — and the Court awards her alimony. 

It is no wonder that the sight of such a life 
has driven many a conscientious woman out of 
society. She is afraid of her temptations. She 
would not, if marrying for money, behave quite 
as badly ; but it might weaken her virtue. She 
sees that no good has come to her early 
friend, excepting very handsome clothes and fine 
equipage ; as for happiness or respectability, 
that has not followed marrying for money. 

One would think that Komeo would dislike to 
ask his wife for money — " Please, clear Juliet, give 
me a ducat ;" but the reverse seems to be the 
case. A man spends his wife's fortune witli 
equanimity, and calls it his. She ought to be 
grateful if he does not spend it on other women. 

Such is the worldly view of the marriage ques- 
tion. Such is the way one looks at the money 
market. It is true, every young couple are not so 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 263 

venal, but we must recognize the growing clanger. 
In America, where estate and title is not inherited, 
we should have no such thing as the marriage de 
convenance, but it is becoming too often a recog- 
nized institution. 

No doubt the human heart is the same in all 
ages — frivolous, tragic, romantic. There will 
always be the elopement, the love match and the 
marriage de convenance. The last is the poorest 
kind for a Republic. 



266 TIIE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNE] 



CHAPTER XXI. 

RECOGNITION AND SALUTATION, 

RECOGNITION should be quick, and saluta- 
tion gracious. To be complimentary, salu- 
tation should be even more — it should be grace- 
ful, nattering, courteous, dignified, and suited 
to the exact position of the person addressed. To 
an old person, it should be truly respectful, for 
there is no such crown as a crown of gray hairs ; 
to a young person, it should be reassuring ; to a 
person who is under the pressure of calamity, it 
should be gracious ; to a common acquaintance, 
just as cordial as we wish to make it — and it 
should always be dignified. Be careful not to bow 
too low. 

One may say that the above advice is imprac- 
ticable, that no one could convey all those adjec- 
tives in a tow. But fascinating and successful 
people do all that, and more. 

The quick recognition is more difficult. Many 
people forget faces, more are confused as to 
where and how they have seen that face last. 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 267 

There is, to the dwellers in cities, a perfect 
confusion as to degrees of acquaintance, if the 
memory for people and faces is not extra- 
ordinary. 

Therefore, people who are near-sighted, or who 
have not memory of faces, cannot be quick at a 
recognition. They are always in doubt. Such 
people are rarely popular. People believe them 
to be cold. 

But if a person has a truly cordial disposition, 
nothing can prevent their showing it finally. 
Manner is but the mask of character after all ; 
the true nature will come out. 

But we cannot all stop, in this busy world, to 
show off our true natures. Emerson says : " The 
men we see are whipped through the world. 
They are harried, wrinkled, anxious : they all 
seem the hacks of some invisible riders. ' ' Women 
are in a great hurry also. The atmosphere drives 
us with invisible whips. How shall we greet 
each other — this great, hurrying and rapidly pass- 
ing stream of people ?. 

We must cultivate a manner, study a recog- 
nition and a salutation which shall convey a 
kindly meaning at least. 



268 THE AMERICAN CODE OE MANNERS. 

As we go thus rapidly through the world, trying 
to do our work as best we may, perhaps we meet 
an old acquaintance who has been for years in 
the East. His face is almost forgotten, but still 
it recalls something. He has not forgotten us, 
and looks eagerly for a bow and a smile. Life 
has, perhaps, been lonely and sad to him ; to us 
it has been replete with emotion and crowded 
with event. Shall we disappoint him ? No ; let 
there be a recognition, as quick and gracious 
as possible, to that wistful face. We can re- 
member who he is afterwards. - It is astonishing 
how soon that memory comes after the necessity 
for it has passed. It is like that belated wit 
which the French call U V esprit cle VeseaMer" — 
the wit of the stair-case— the good things which 
we remember that we might have said as we gc 
upstairs to bed after the party is over. 

Let at least the passer-by read in yor:r face 
your desire to be courteous. If you cannot 
remember him, at least give him a pleasant bow, 
if he bows to you. Such salutations hurt nobody, 
not even a lady alone, who, of course, must be 
circumspect. In the polite bow of a lady, full of 
purity and good-will, marked with dignity and 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 2G9 

respect, the man of irregular life finds as profound 
a check to insult, as in the haughty disdain of one 
who, perhaps, overestimates his admiration. 

There is nothing finer than a sweet dignity. It 
seems to be, perhaps, the best quality of a 
woman, and to teach her, intuitively, how low to 
bow, how to smile, how to receive and how to 
dismiss her friends. AVomen whose manners are 
too familiar never have much power. People do 
not care for that which they gain easily, and yet 
cordiality is a very necessary adjunct. A woman 
who can express that by a bow is sure to be a 
favorite. 

If a gentleman comes up to a lady at a crowded 
watering-place, and claims acquaintance, and 
she has no idea who he is — an incident 
which happens frequently — she should, after 
speaking to him, frankly tell him her dilemma, 
and ask for his name. She can say to him, that 
she has a poor memory for faces, that she sees 
many people, that she begs that he will forgive 
her. Few men are, and none ought to be, so ill- 
tempered as to object to this inquiry. If they are 
so thin-skinned as to care, the acquaintance may 
as well stop there. 



270 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

To make the case our own, let us measure our 
sensations toward our friends by their remem- 
bered salutations. We have no very kindly 
feeling toward Mrs. Tower, who gives us a lofty 
and brief bow, as if she wished to get rid of us as 
soon as possible ; still less do we admire Mrs. 
Smiley, who bows very much too low, and with 
an excessively foolish cordiality which we know 
she docs not feel. We are not fond of Mrs. 
Weathercock, who bows to us fervently, when 
we are fashionable and well dressed, but who 
does not see us, when we are under the ban of 
adversity. 

But we remember Mrs. HeartwelFs elegant and 
formal courtesy with pleasure, for it shows that 
she intends always to be perfectly respectful to us. 

Of course, from this, all through the gamut of 
the affectionate greetings we range our friends. 
There is the curiously-acute eye and the long- 
resting glance of Mr. Oakland ; he is the most 
interesting of our acquaintances, for his bow 
always says : " 1 should like to stop and talk 
with you," or that of General Tightiit, which 
expresses the most exalted respect. 

The bow of a clergyman, a lawyer, an editor, 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 271 

a president, a man who is compelled to know 
everybody, can scarcely be called a disinterested 
bow. It must be a somewhat formal, studied 
and conventional bow. For no man can feel 
equally well disposed toward three thousand 
people ; but the character of the individual will 
stamp even this universal bow. 

The reason of the unpopularity of a certain dis- 
tinguished family in the United States, and their 
certain defeat if proposed for any public office, 
is attributed, by close observers, to their disagree- 
able, cold and rude manners, in the matter of 
recognition and salutation — the frigid bow and 
the contemptuous salutation. 

It must be conceded that Americans have 
better manners than the English, but even here 
the Anglo-Saxon brutality does break out in us 
occasionally. The Latin races are far ahead of 
us in the matter of salutations. The Italian lan- 
guage is full of mos. lovely phrases. "A thou- 
sand beautiful days to you," says the Italian. 
The Oriental salutations are as splendid as their 
robes, "May you live -a thousand years;" the 
very exaggeration and impossibility of the re- 
quest is in its favor. It breathes such large con- 



272 THE AMERICAN CODE OE MANNERS. 

sideration. How ungraceful would it be to limit 
that request so as to say: "May you live sixty 
years," or even ninety years. It is better to 
make a handsome allowance, even of nine hun- 
dred years. 

Our perception far outruns our talent, and we 
know people, intuitively, by a bow or a salutation. 
We read the cold-blooded cynic or the hypocrit- 
ical time-server by his bow and smile. A deep 
sympathy is all that we require to teach us, that 
the shy man would be more responsive, if he 
could, and that the gauche man is sincere, and 
would like to be graceful. There is, of course, a 
difference of impressionability ; but the most 
simple and sincere are apt to be the keenest read- 
ers of character. A child and a dog are never 
mistaken. 

We should watch and cherish not only all right 
sentiments of the heart, but all intellectual and 
moral sensibilities. They are the fountains of 
true perception. 

If we thus question the recognition and saluta- 
tions of our neighbors, we shall grow more genial, 
cordial and polite ourselves. We shall remember 
to say to the sick man, " How are you to-day ?" 



TKS AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 273 

and add, " Better, I hope," with a cheerful voice. 
Wo shall take care to bow to the shy and the poor 
and the friendless, in a manner which shall make 
them happier all day. We shall not forget the 
passing salutation to our unknown friend whom 
we meet on the road. He is to go on the same 
weary way over which we have just come. Let 
us give him a passing smile and benediction. 
Lohengrin met a weary pilgrim, to whom he gave 
water, and the pilgrim gave him a staff. He 
planted the staff in the earth, and the wood grew 
and blossomed into lilies. Then, says the 
legend, Lohengrin knew that he had saluted an 
angel unawares. 

" The world is always opulent, the oracles are 
never silent, but the receiver must, by a happy 
temperance, be brought to that top of condition, 
that frolic health, that he can easily take and give 
these communications. 5 ' 

We are not always in the mood to salute angels ; 
we do not always have an angel to salute. It is 
an imperfect world, full of impoliteness, but to 
rise superior to that imperfection, to be always 
gracious and polite, is to meet one's fate more 
than half-way ; to do a great deal toward being, 



274 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

what we should always hope to be — true gentle- 
men and true ladies. 

It is a sign of success, that fine manner which 
is always expressive of a good heart, and a true 
respect, for all whom we meet. 

Kecognition and salutation ai^ vulgarized and 
barbarously maimed by a coarseness of manner 
on the part of young women. 

A gentleman once said that he had fallen in 
love with a gentle girl, but that he had heard her 
say, in a stentorian voice, to a passing youth, 
"How are you, Charley?" and his love had 
turned to bitterest hate. He did not like that 
assumption of mannishness. It would have 
pleased him better if she had addressed Charley 
with a spice of maidenly reserve. 

Foreigners have a beautiful custom of saluting 
the dead. Whenever they pass a coffin they take 
off their hats ; to that silent majesty, who cannot 
respond ? The custom, in Europe, of having the 
coffin lying in state at the door of the inner court, 
as in Paris, with the respectful salutation, has 
moved many a heart ; it is the veriest spirit of 
reverential politeness. 

Remember how easy it is to depress the world 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 275 

with a gloomy countenance. There is not a joy- 
ful youth or an innocent girl, buoyant with life, 
who cannot be chilled by an unkind salutation. 
Despondency comes readily enough to us all. The 
daily greeting of our friends can raise or depress 
our spirits for a day. 

" I have just met Mr." Iceland, and his bow has 
given me a severe cold in the head, ' ' said a wit. 

And to think that, by a bow or a smile, we may 
add energy, inspire hope, and help some brother 
to fight the battle of life ! Charles Lamb writes 
a delightful sketch of Captain Jackson, a poor 
half-pay omcer, whose wealth of imagination 
made life seem gloriously luxurious, and whose 
hearty salutation was enough to make you believe 
yourself worth a fortune and endowed with per- 
petual youth. 

And be careful at home to remember the 
morning and evening salutation. The good man- 
ners of a household are generated as the atmos- 
phere is generated by perpetual renewals. The 
household is purer and happier, where the mother 
kisses her son every morning, where the daughter 
kisses her father, with a good-night blessing. 
All members of a family are better and happier, 



270 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

if they begin the morning with a salutation to 
each other. 

Nothing is so out of taste, or so productive of 
ill-feeling, as the somewhat reprehensible practice 
of saying disagreeable things to each other, and 
calling it familiarity. It is of that familiarity 
which breeds, not only contempt, but hatred. 

A brother, who enters the room and addresses 
his sister with "How now, Louisa? Why, you 
look as yellow as saffron, your eyes are like 
gooseberries !" is a cad ; a sister who remarks, 
" Do leave the house, Harry, your cigar is most 
offensive," and so on. These are salutations 
which could be omitted. 

The telling of people that they look very badly 
is another salutation which had better be omitted, 
unless to those people " who enjoy bad health," 
and are very glad to be always complaining. There 
are a set of hipped individuals who, in perfect 
health, delight to play with gloom and who say : 

" Tend me to-night ; 
Maybe it is the period of your duty i 
Haply you shall not see me more, or if, 
A mangled shadow ! perchance to-morrow 
You'll serve another master ; I look on you 
As one who takes his leave I" 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 277 

Such a malade imaginaire delights to be told 
that he looks ill. Let us gratify him. He will be 
up to-morrow, eat an immense breakfast and 
attend all our funerals. 

The manners of Puritan Yankeedom, which, in 
the rural districts, delight in plain truths, de- 
lighted in such salutations as this : " Well, 
I see you are getting old as well as myself !" 
" Ain't you looking a little too thin ? Seems to 
me you are rather down," and various compli- 
mentary reassurances of that kind. There is no 
curing such a truthful spirit as that ! Let us hope 
that it will live and die in its own mountains. 

Human nature is such a poor thing at best that 
it needs all the aid it can receive from a cordial 
greeting. Never be afraid to take the initiative 
in politeness, and remember to be respectful to 
those in age and position who are your superiors : 

" Great men may jest with saints, 'tis wit in them ; 
But in the less, foul profanation." 

A man cannot be too respectful in his saluta- 
tion to a lady. A lady cannot be too gracious in 
her salutation to all people, if modesty ind 
dignity reign in her heart. 



278 THE AMERICAN CODE OE MANNERS. 



CHAPTEE XXII. 

THE ARAB LAW OF HOSPITALITY. 

IT was the remark of a famous editor who 
visited America several years ago, and who 
afterward wrote a book about us, that an Ameri- 
can knew how to be a host, but did not yet 
understand the etiquette of being a guest. 

It is probably quite true that, according to the 
English idea, an American did not, in former 
years, understand the severe etiquette which 
reigns in an English country-house. There the 
guests are expected to come at the hour invited, 
and to leave precisely by the train which is speci- 
fied in the note of the host. 

The reason for this is obvious. A number of 
guests are invited, with great system, for three 
days, and another company for the ensuing three 
days, which invitation is always so accurate that 
it specifies even if the guest is to leave by the 
"eleven train," or the "one train," as they say 
in England. 

The great house is thus filled continuously with 



THE AMERICAN CCDE OF MANNERS. 279 

a series of congenial guests from the 1st of 
September until after Christmas. The leisure 
man who is a good story-teller, can sing a song, 
or act in private theatricals, is always in great 
demand, and on the events of these country 
visits hang most of the incidents of the modern 
society novel. Dickens described the less stately 
kospitaiity of the English country squire in his 
" Christmas at the Wardles," where the re- 
nowned Pickwick Club spent, perhaps, the most 
jolly week of which we have any account in mod- 
ern contemporaneous literature. 

But even jolly Mr. Wardle, or the class which 
he represents, would be particular as to a certain 
etiquette. Mr. Wardle would expect all his 
guests to arrive at the hour which he had 
named, and always to be punctual at dinner. 

It would be better for us in this country if we 
were as particular about the duties of a guest. 
We are too apt to go and see our friends when 
it is convenient for us, and not when it is con- 
venient for them. Trusting to that boundless 
American hospitality, we decline an invitation 
for the 6th, saying we can come on the 9th of the 
month. 



280 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

This is not etiquette ; we should go on the 6th , 
or not at all. We should also ask our host to 
define the limits of our stay, so that we may not 
overstep our welcome. The terms of an Ameri- 
can invitation generally are : "Come when you 
can, and stay as long as you like," which is, cer- 
tainly, hospitable, but it is not etiquette. 

Now, the Arab law of hospitality, which has been 
the phrase with winch we have chosen to head 
this paper, is so noble, so comprehensive and so 
grand, that, although it transcends all etiquette, 
we must use it to enforce the meaning of eti- 
quette and its vital spirit. 

"■Welcome the coming, speed the parting 
guest," is found in the Arabian as well as the 
Latin poets. The Arab goes further: "He who 
tastes my salt is sacred ; neither I nor my house- 
hold shall attack him ; nor shall one word be 
said against him." "Bring corn, wine and fruit 
for the fasting stranger ; give the one who departs 
from the shelter of thy tent the fastest horse in 
thy possession. Let him who would go from thee 
take the fleet dromedary ; reserve the lame one 
for thyself." 

These children of the desert, with their grave 



THE AMERICAN CODE OE MANNERS* 281 

faces, composed manners and noble creed of hos- 
pitality, could preach us moderns many a lesson 
in etiquette. 

One phrase should be particularly studied : 
" Nor shall one word be said against him." 

Unless a guest has been particularly objection- 
able, it is in the worst taste to criticise him se- 
verely after he has gone. He has come to you at 
your invitation. He has staid at your house at 
your request. He has come as to an altar of 
safety, an ark of refuge, to your friendly rocf. 
Your kind welcome has unlocked his reserve. 
He has spoken freely, laid off his armor, felt that 
he was in the presence of friends. If, in so 
doing, you have discovered in him a weak spot, 
be careful how you attack it. The intimate un- 
reserve of your fireside should be respected. 

And upon the guest an equal, nay, a superior, 
conscientiousness should rest, as to any revelation 
of what particular secrets he may find out while 
he is a visitor. No person should go from house 
to house bearing tales. No stories of the weak- 
nesses of this member of the family, or the eccen- 
tricities of that member, should ever be heard 
from the lips of a guest. u Whof bread I have 



282 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

eaten, lie is henceforth my brother," is another 
fine Arab proverb, worthy of being engraven on 
all our walls. 

Much harm is done by the gadding and the 
gossiping visitor through this thoughtless habit of 
telling of the manner of life, and of the faults, 
shortcomings, or quarrels, of the family under 
whose roof the careless talker has been admitted. 
Even much talk of their habits and ways is in 
bad taste. Speak always well of your entertain- 
ers, but speak little of their domestic arrange- 
ments ; do not violate the sanctity of that fireside 
retreat, whose roof-tree has sheltered you : 

" Bede the rede of the old roof tree, 
Scandal none, opinion free, 
Knightly custom, Christian knee, 
Age calm, but youthful jollity ; 
Outside no traitor to his tryst 
(No word to which he haply list) 
Shall blur the picture of that home, 
Which brought those in who widely roam, 
But grateful thanks and courtesie 
Should upward float to thee, old tree." 

Such is the true old Anglo-Saxon idea of the duty 
of a guest. We cannot improve upon it. 

The manifest etiquette demands that, once in 
your friend's house, you inform yourself as to the 
hours and customs, and conform exactly. Break- 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 283 

fast is an informal meal, and most large houses 
now allow their guests to take a cup of tea and 
an egg in their own room, and to not regularly 
breakfast until eleven or twelve o'clock. But if 
the host is particular as to an early breakfast, 
and the hostess says, ' ' We shall expect you at the 
breakfast table at eight o'clock," her guest is 
bound to obey. 

rn most houses, however, the guest can break - 
fast when he pleases. A cold ham on the side- 
board, and the oatmeal, coffee or tea which 
makes the modern breakfast, can be readily 
served at any hour. The American breakfast, 
with its steaks, chops, fried, stewed and baked 
potatoes, eggs in a dozen forms, hot cakes, toast, 
fruit and tea and coffee, fried fish and chicken 
(cold), and chicken broiled, is a meal unknown 
on the Continent — that luxury is reserved for the 
dejeuner d lafourchette, or more like what we call 
luncheon. A little strained honey, rolls, fresh 
butter, with cheese, serves always for the break- 
fast in Switzerland. In France, a cup of cafe-ait- 
ia&t, a roll and butter is enough. In England, a 
roll or muffins and jam, with excellent black tea, 
and a cold cut r.t the sideboard, is quite enough. 



V 



284 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

Our American breakfast, though delicious, is 
quite too much to begin the day on. We should be 
better for the more delicate breakfast of the Swiss. 

As breakfast is always an informal meal, a 
gentleman may get up and help a lady. It is 
rather pleasant to dismiss the servants and to 
wait on one's self at breakfast. 

But dinner is always a formal meal. The guests 
should be sure to be punctual, to be dressed, to 
be in good spirits, and in a talking mood, at din- 
ner. It is the quintessence of the day. We must 
save our best story, our jeu d'esprit, our bon mot, 
if we are so lucky as to have any, for dinner. 

As guests, we are bound to make ourselves as 
agreeable as possible. No little tempers, no sour 
looks, no adverse opinions, no unpleasant criti- 
cisms, should fall from the lips of a guest. The 
most disagreeable of all circumstances should 
find a guest firmly good-tempered. We are -not 
asked to our friend's house " to show our little 
tempers." 

Never abuse the weather, cr the family dog. 
Although the long storm may seem tedious, the 
weather, for the nonce, is the property of your 
host. Try in every way to counteract the exter- 



THE AMERICAN CODE OE MANNERS, 285 

nal gloom by suggesting that you can get up 
tableaux or private theatricals, or that you know 
a trick or two at cards. A guest should always be 
able to take a hand at whist or bezique, and should 
be very composed as to draughts or the heat of a 
room. Never ask to have a door or a window 
open, if the hostess looks as if she did not like it. 
Be first and always attentive to her. She is the 
queen ; be her dutiful subject. 

The family dog is a very hard case to manage. 
If he be ugly, and frighten you, go around him 
CEiEtiously ; if he be dirty and offensive, and if, 
like Macbeth' s crime, " he smell to heaven, " never 
speak of it. A family are always sensitive on this ' 
point. They will defend the dog at the cost of 
their lives, and as a guest, if you would preserve 
your popularity, do you also defend, praise and 
endure the family dog. 

The servants, too, are another tender point. 
No one, however judicious and kindly, can bear 
to hear their servants badly spoken of We are ^ 

the servants of our servants, and we grow to harbor 
their defects as being our own property. We are 
jealous of their good name, even if we are aware 
of their faults. We like to abuse them ourselves, 



286 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

but we do not intend that any one else shall abuse 
them. 

Above all things, never join in when one mem- 
ber of tne family attacks another. This is never 
forgiven. We can be firm and assured in our 
own hatred of our kindred, but we never like to 
have anybody else attack them. A father-in-law 
may call his daughter-in-law all sorts of names, 
but no one else can do so with impunity to him. 
A mother may abuse her daughter very vehe- 
mently for making an imprudent marriage, but 
she will never forgive any one else for doing so. 
A brother will call his brother a fool, and even 
criticise his sister unfavorably, but, if the guest 
agree with him, he will turn upon the guest as 
upon an enemy. 

As for those who interfere between husband 
and wife, history, poetry and the drama have 
sufficiently elucidated their unhappy fate. Mr. 
Snodgrass, in " Pickwick " (to refer to that immor- 
tal book again), declared that he got the bootjack 
on one side of his head and the hair-brush on the 
other. 

It is human nature. Our self-love is so great, 
and so incorporated in the idea of our next of 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 287 

kin, that we cannot bear that they should be 
spoken of by others as we ourselves speak of them. 

The Arab law thus holds good through all the 
transmutations of fashion and of time. We must 
be truthful, honest, sincere and good-tempered. 
Or if we are none of these things, we must simu- 
late a virtue, if we have it not, or else we are not 
fit to be guests. We must, in spite of our con- 
victions, maintain an amiable hypocrisy. 

It is slavery, no doubt. But visiting, however 
pleasant, is a sort of slavery — our chains are 
gilded and bound with roses, but we must ac- 
knowledge that they are chains. 

Only people who have sufficient love of appro- 
bation to be always amiable should ever attempt 
to visit. 

The heroic and independent people, who can- 
not " conform," should never try to be guests. 

The Arab law of hospitality, no doubt, though 
unspoken, demanded that such people should 
stay at home. 

Be punctual, be ready to take a back seat, be 
patient as to a small room, accept every favor 
graciously, and every neglect with particular 
sweetness, if you would be a popular guest. 



283 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

CHAPTER XXIII. 

CHARACTERISTICS OF DIFFERENT CITIES. 



1 



T^OKEIGNEES find the inhabitants of our 
cities differing so decidedly in their ideas 
of etiquette, that they often declare that a 
placard should "be set up in every city defining 
the different order of behavior to be expected in 
each. 

Washington, for instance, our capital, has the 
manners of a cosmopolitan foreign city. The 
latest comers must call first. It is etiquette to 
leave a card, not only on the President, but on 
each of the Secretaries, and on every foreign 
Minister, on the judges of the Supreme Court, on 
all officials, and on the officers of the army and 
navy, and upon such distinguished citizens as 
are in the habit of receiving. 

These cards should all be returned within three 
days at farthest. Mrs. Fish, who was a model of 
propriety and of elegant manners, always re- 
turned her cards the next day. The name of her 
reception day, in the corner of her card, gave 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 289 

her visitor leave to call again on that day. This 
sensible form of allowing the new-comer to call 
first saves a world of time and trouble. 

But great, busy, commercial New York has no 
such sensible law ; people must wait to be called 
upon, and there is a vast deal of trouble and 
fuss. 

Indeed, it is not to be wondered at that people 
often give up trying to get at their friends in 
New York. It is a busy, selfish, preoccupied 
place. 

Yet, when a person is well introduced, no city 
can be more hospitable. It is a city of grand 
dinners, magnificent receptions and the most 
recherche entertainments. But social and truly 
hospitable it cannot be — it is too large a con- 
glomerate. 

The old saying was, that, in Philadelphia, peo- 
ple asked w?w you were ; in Washington, they 
asked what you were ; in New York, how much 
you were worth ; in Boston, who your grand- 
father was. It is a just classification. The old 
and respectable aristocracies of Philadelphia and 
Boston still have time to concern themselves 
with ancestries. There is no such trifiincr in New 



290 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

York. " Moi ! Je suis mon ancetre" was the proud 
remark of Napoleon. It is that of almost every 
New Yorker. It is a self-made town. 

In Washington, where intellectual prominence 
— or what we Yankees call "smartness" — pre- 
vails, the natural inquiry would be : " What does 
he or she know ? Can he talk well ? What is he ?" 

In consequence, the society at Washington is 
quite unparalleled in agreeability. If there is 
anything in a man, it comes out in Washington. 
It is the city of agreeable conversations ; it is 
the sphere of charming little dinners. No one 
can be local or narrow at Washington. 

It is to be feared that conversation is somewhat 
local and provincial in both of the aristocratic 
cities — Boston and Philadelphia. They know so 
well ivho they are tJiemselves, that they expect you 
to know. They talk of Louisa, and Sarah, and 
Edward, as if you, too, knew who Louisa, and 
Sarah, and Edward are. One English nobleman 
declared that a Philadelphian mentioned that, 
when Daniel Webster came to Philadelphia, "he 
had sat in his pew at church," a fact which did 
not interest the English nobleman much, but 
which was very important to the Philadelphian . In 



THE AMERICAN CODE OE MANNERS. 291 

Boston, although the most intellectual of our 
cities — " the Athens of America," " the Hub of the 
Universe" — society is very local and condensed ; 
families have intermarried, wealth and conse- 
quence are in the hands of a few, and these few 
desire to keep it in the fewest hands. They are 
very indifferent to outside influences, and the 
society, to a stranger, is frigid and cold. But, 
when once penetrated, it is delightful ; and those 
who know it well, like it better than any other. 
No one must attempt, however, to storm it. It is 
a city on a hill which cannot be hid, but it is well 
protected by the invincible reserve of its people, 
and one of its wits has said that a Boston man is 
"condensed East wind," which is not so bad a 
criticism. 

Philadelphia is far more open-handed and easy 
of access than Boston, for the old Quaker hospi- 
tality has been joined to a southern warmth, and 
it has produced a jolly sort of open-handed hos- 
pitality. They feed one in Philadelphia as if they 
intended to make a pate de foie gras of you, and 
they are very delightful hosts. But beware how 
you attempt to marry one of their daughters — 
unless you have sixteen quarterings and a grand- 



292 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

father ! They are particular about a grandfather 
in Philadelphia. 

Baltimore is a delightful city, although aristo- 
cratic to the backbone. It is a very hospitable, 
cosmopolitan town, and has the cavalier element 
widely prevalent in its still gay society. The 
memory of Charles Calvert, Lord Baltimore, has 
given it somewhat of an English tone. But it is 
the best of all tones — there is nothing snobbish 
about it. 

New Orleans — gay Creole city — had great charm 
before the war ; perhaps it has still. It is well 
placed for hospitality, and the old French popu- 
lation insures gaiety and a freedom from a false 
economy, or what seems as such. 

Many strangers are struck with the Puritan 
economy of Boston. It is never a lavish city, 
and sometimes this note strikes harshly on the 
ear of a foreigner. 

Of course, New York is " the Paris of America," 
and must ever have the greatest attractions for 
a stranger. Even if he cannot get into society, 
he can amuse himself at the many theatres and 
at the ever-changeful aspect of its streets. 

A stranger should always bring letters of intro- 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 293 

duction, even if only from another city. A lady 
will always be glad to send a card for her re- 
ceptions to a well-introduced man. She cannot, 
of course, do so unless she knows that he is a 
gentleman. 

For much mischief has been done in New 
York by the willingness some hostesses have 
shown in introducing the most specious and 
plausible of adventurers— those who travel with 
a handle to their names. Nothing is so hard a3 
to doubt a prince, a lord, or a marquis. Yet a 
prince nicked a pocket at a lady's reception in 
New York (he was a Russian prince), and she 
was obliged to apologize to her guests for having 
to send for a policeman, to at least frighten the 
high-born villain. When she asked his Minister 
for his character he said : " Yes, madame ; one 
of the worst rascals in Russia. He cannot visit 
in St. Petersburg." 

With all our care the villains will get in, and, 
alas ! good people, modest people, are kept out. 
It is a sad state of things that there is no social 
weighing ground where the true qualities of a 
guest can be tested. Yet it finally settles itself, 
and people get to know each other, somehow. 



294 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

There are certain predatory arabs in all cities, 
who go about doing pretty much as they please. 
No one can say why or wherefore they are 
tolerated ; we must only bow our heads, and 
— tolerate them. 

To show a thorough delicacy as to accepting 
civilities, to wait to be formally invited to all 
parties, is the etiquette of every city. One can- 
not be too particular on this point. Never ac- 
cept a verbal invitation, such as " Come and dine 
with me any day," from people whom you know 
slightly. You will scarcely ever hit upon the 
right day. 

Such invitations mean nothing. If your friend 
wants you to come, let him want you so much 
that he will specify the day and hour. Let him 
say, in so many words, that he wishes you to dine 
with him on Thursday, at seven o'clock. It is 
then a very certain thing. 

And you must remember, if an invited guest, 
to answer such an invitation immediately, and to 
keep the engagement with as much solemnity as 
you. would keep an oath. No one can trifle with 
a dinner engagement. And, before leaving a city, 
make a dinner call. In all cities this is an in- 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 295 

violable rule. It makes exceedingly bad feeling 
if this not too onerous duty is neglected. 

Newport, which is a sort of summer Washing- 
ton, is governed by almost the same rules as 
Washington, except that the new-comer does not 
call first, except upon Mr. Bancroft, or some very 
great man. The proprieties allow of a lady 
sending her cards to her friends, saying where 
she is staying. Now that Newport has a Casino, 
where she can place her guests before the world, 
as one lays a pack of cards on a table, this one 
necessity of informing your friends of where you 
are is done away with. There are no kursaals 
or casinos in New York, Boston, Philadelphia, 
Washington or New Orleans. The m ore's the 
pity. It would be as convenient as a " clearing 
house for cards." 

Society is in a transition state in America, and 
one is very glad of anything which helps to settle 
mooted points, such a mooted point, for instance, 
as who shall call first, who shall be received, and 
who shall not. These are now left to the hospi- 
tality and good nature of the individual. 

Everything is apt to be better on acquaint- 
ance. " Even," as Willis says in his " Pencilings 



29(5 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

by the Way" — " even a camel— unsightly as a 
camel is, with its long, snaky neck, its frightful 
hump and its awkward legs and action — wins 
upon your kindness with a little acquaintance. 
Its eye is exceedingly fine ; there is a lustrous, 
suffused softness in its large hazel orb that is the 
rarest beauty in a human eye." 

If so much beauty can be found in a camel, 
how much may be discerned in the most un- 
promising human acquaintance ! 

Therefore, exclusiveness is not only hateful and 
disagreeable, after a certain point, but it cheats 
the person, who tries to adopt it, of a thousand 
pleasures. The people whom we shun may be, 
after all, the people whom we should like to 
know. We are cheating ourselves, and not them. 

For too exclusive people are not always agree- 
able people. The most gifted, and rare, and un- 
common people are not the most exclusive. Sir 
Walter Scott could know everybody, and yet not 
sully his bright genius. Gen. Washington said 
that he would not be outdone in politeness by a 
black man. 

Cultivated people are apt to live in great seclu- 
sion in our country, and, having neither intrigue, 



THE AMERICAN CODE OE MANNERS. 29 S 

nor fashion, nor money making to think of, they 
are apt to depend entirely upon books for their 
amusement, and, therefore, when they come into 
fashionable society they have nothing to talk 
about ; for dogs, horses, cards, polo, lawn tennis, 
dress and the last scandal, Mrs. Bigtree's dinner 
and Mrs. Smallweed's, tea are what society people 
mostly converse upon, So the somewhat uncon- 
genial nature of Boston society may be accounted 
for by the amount of culture which we know 
exists there. 

Philadelphia has an isolated position, and has 
preserved its old customs and houses wonderfully. 
Its characteristics are very marked and highly re- 
spectable. It could perhaps, however, be im- 
proved by more breadth of street and views. 

New York is a French city, a German city, a 
Spanish city, a Yankee city, and an English city. 
No one can fathom what its wonderful Banyan- 
tree growth will be in a hundred years. It is now 
the greatest curiosity as to its abnormal condition 
in regard to etiquette ; yet to those who are well- 
bred, or who desire to become so, New York 
offers the most perfect and the most delight- 
ful society possible in the world. If New York 



298 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

has a peculiarity, it is its thoroughly American 
extravagance. 

It is the most expensive town in the world. 
Over-fine clothes, over-fine equipages, over-fine 
houses are its characteristics. Its great merchants 
have made great fortunes. They are, without 
doubt, exceedingly magnificent. 

Still, society can never arrive at its most refined 
type, while wealth and display are the prominent 
characteristics of a great city. 

The sunshine and gladness of its climate, its 
thousand enchantments, its very quick, passionate 
pulse, its movement, even its dissipation, its va- 
riety and its cosmopolitan character, all tend to 
distinguish New York as the very field for a polite 
society — for a perfect and a sensible etiquette. 
All these things bring many healthy people to- 
gether in great hope of there spending their 
lives, and of there trying their powers, and those 
people should so judiciously temper each other's 
peculiarities, that they may make a perfect society 
and induce a sensible etiquette. 



IS AMERICAN CODE OF MANSERS. 899 



CHAPTER XXIY. 

THE MORALS OF FASHION. 

LET us dash an assent at the heads of the 
enemies of fashion, and say, at once, that 
the morals of fashion are bad. Let us al- 
low that the present story of the aristocracy of 
England is a disgraceful one, that the marriage 
contract is not the holy and inviolable thing 
which it once was. Let us concede everything. 
It is the best platform for argument. 

Let us concede that it is the day of the married 
flirts, that women allow themselves to be talked 
about, that the precious pearl, "a good name," 
is often sold for a less precious pearl necklace 
imported by Tiffany ; all this is true — too true. 

And yet we shall find no stern moralist, who 
does not wish her daughter to be in the fashion. 
Why is this contradiction ? 

Fashion means so much. It means pre-eminence 
among our kind, it is leadership, it is success, it 
is pleasure, it is gay delight, it is the front seat. 

Therefore, we must image fashionable life 



300 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS 

as a great sea on which all crafts are sailing. 
Here is a craft which we all know is not sea- 
worthy, and yet it makes great show on the 
waters — it outsails ail other craft, it is the fore- 
most yacht of the squadron. We see a very top- 
heavy look about her sails, and a dangerous tip 
to her keel, yet she gets ahead. Is it strange that 
all the yachts try to imitate her ? It is not until 
she goes down that we say : ' ' Alas ! there was 
always something wrong." 

Now, it is to be observed, on the other hand, 
that all fashionable people are not bad. It is per- 
fectly possible to touch pitch and to not be de- 
filed. «We are all of us susceptible to good as 
well as to evil impressions. A lovely mother and 
her lovely daughter ma} 7 " go about together 
through the excesses of fashion, as they would 
pick their way through a dirty lane, and neither 
would soil their feet. But it requires several 
talents to enable one to accomplish tlr'p 

First, purity of heart ; to the pure, all things 
are pure. Secondly, clearness of head; one 
must see where vivacity ends, and where vulgarity 
begins. Thirdly, a self-command which is nearly, 
if not quite, miraculous. 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 301 

With these three adjuncts, a woman may be as 
fashionable as she pleases, and still remain a good 
woman. She may be the companion of women 
who use their charms as a means of procuring 
camel' s -hair shawls, and Worth dresses, and 
diamonds, and yet maintain a reputation ; 
she may know these whited sepulchres, and still 
remain pure. Claims of family keep bad wo- 
men in society, and are all-powerful. They can- 
not be read out. The pure must know them, and 
be assorted with them in the general estimation, 
yet they can remain correct themselves. 

With clearness of head, a mother can decide 
just how much she will allow her daughter to 
dance, just how much she will allow her to 
ride on top of a coach, how much she shall dress, 
what men she shall know. It is a question which 
constantly asks itself — how much ? 

For no mother must conceal from herself the 
fact that, under its garb of flowers, society is 
a masquerade of hate. The serpents of envy, 
hatred, detraction and malice are bred by the 
very warmth and richness of the soil. If a 
woman is richer than her neighbors, entertains 
moie and better, there are those who will say 



C02 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

disagreeable things about her. If a woman has 
the fatal gift of beauty, there are always spirits, 
full of detraction, who will doubt the genuineness 
of the color, and find falseness in the smile. 

If a woman has that mysterious talent which 
includes all talents — a talent for success — she may 
be sure that she will be attacked. She has no 
armor of proof that will defend her from the 
sneers of the unsuccessful. 

But what soldier, who had the proper stuff in 
him, ever left or shunned the field of battle be- 
cause there was danger there ? What woman re- 
treats before such foes as these ? Rather fight 
and be killed, than to run away. 

However, a knowledge of these facts is worth 
having. One must, to bo a woman of fashion, a 
woman of the world, enter the lists knowing the 
power of her adversary. She may perpetually 
carry off the wreath, but she must fight her battle 
with eternal vigilance. 

Now, knowing what is to be feared, let us see 
what is to be gained. 

The society of our kind, the cultivation of the 
social virtues. We have read in Rabelais and in 
Browning the evils of a conventional, an isolated, 



TITE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 303 

life. No horrible, morbid vice, but may flourish in 
the isolation of an unnecessary solitude. A man 
grows to loathe himself, to hate his kind, who is 
shut out from the world. The surest way to drive 
a woman mad was ascertained by the old Italian 
nobles, who secluded a hated wife in a lonely, 
malarial castle. There is a malaria of the mind 
winch is worse than that of the body, and which 
as surely accompanies solitude. 

Man was not meant to live alone. Better by 
far, society with its false growths, and Fashion 
with its shifting face, than a seclusion which may 
lead to selfish introspection, and to a morbid 
distrust. 

Hawthorne, whose solitary habits clouded his 
genius, and gave us those morbid dissections, 
which can be illy spared as artistic studies, but 
which are not disposed to encourage cheerful 
views of the human heart, regretted that he had 
e$rev cultivated "the cursed habit of solitude." 
He, undoubtedly, was less happy for it. There is 
something in the attrition of society which is 
good for the body as it is for the mind. Perhaps, 
we lose by contact some unnecessary electricity 
with which we are charged ; perhaps, it stimulates 



304 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

the circulation an I gives us a more robust pulse. 
Certainly, it saves us from ourselves. Society 
brightens up the wits, and causes the dullest 
mind to bring its treasures to the surface. Social 
intercourse has brought out for us the thought of 
Macaulay and the laughter of Sidney Smith, the 
wisdom of Montaigne and the profound sarcasm 
of Voltaire, the humor of Tom Hood and the 
noble wit of Thackeray. 

Could we have afforded to lose all this, and 
more — the noble procession of people of wit and 
thought, through fashionable life — because also 
Fashion brings a few false growths. 

It is a lamentable commentary on human folly, 
and the snobbishness which is said to underlie all 
the virtues, that a monarch can entirely alter the 
view of tuhat is virtue, by making vice the fashion. 
One needs but to compare the state of English 
society during the life of the admirable Prince 
Consort, and the present state of society under 
the dissolute Prince, his son, to see it all. 

Now the Queen is obliged to shut up Windsor 
Castle against " prof essional beauties" and the 
divorced or separated American adventuresses 
whom the Prince chooses to force upon English 






THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 305 

society. There is no such tyranny as this. If the 
Prince says, "Let her be invited," the virtuous 
English matron and her pure daughter must re- 
ceive the worst woman who lives, and to this 
sort of tyranny was France subjected during the 
lives of Louis XIV. and XV. The letters of Mine, 
de Sevigne to her daughter tell the story. 

Fashion, in our country, it is to be feared, is 
trying the role of the Prince of Wales. It is very 
fascinating to an American mamma to hear her 
daughter called Lady So-and-so, and, if she can 
achieve it by fastness, she is apt to encourage a 
little fastness. It is astonishing to read of the 
tremendous sacrifices, humiliations and pecuniary 
struggles which American mothers and fathers 
go through for the sake of a titled alliance. This 
is the worst weakness of fashion. 

Thus we go on seeing the lights and shadows, 
and begin to doubt whether or not the shadows 
predominate. 

The " Morals of Fashion " may have another 
reading. We may say that Fashion has its own 
morality. It is the fashion, fortunately, in the 
gay world, to keep one's engagements, to pay 
one's debts particularly one's social debts ; to 



306 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

dress oneself well, to make oneself agreeable. 
There is no doubt that Fashion makes ths world 
more brilliant — a better place to live in. It brings 
to its adornment flowers, music, gay colors, 
gems, fine furniture, horses, carriages and splen- 
did houses. "The pride of life" is a superb 
thing, it is useless to undervalue it. 

Fashion keeps alive a thousand industries. It 
has its benevolent side. Let a charity become 
fashionable, and it always succeeds. A fashion- 
able church seems a misnomer, but it has its 
uses. Many a person who is wholly worldly, and 
could be reached no other way, may be touched 
some day, under her silk and furs, by the silvery 
tones of the Reverend Morphine Velvet. Even 
his drawled utterances cannot stifle the beauty of 
that clarion call — " What shall all things benefit 
me, if I lose my own soul." 

Then, again, a noble word may be spoken by a 
great prophet, which shall rouse the congregation 
to better things. 

Fashion makes all sorts of people. Sometimes 
it brings out a scornful beauty — 

" Disdain and scorn ride sparkling in her eyes, 
Misprising what they look on, and her wit 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 307 

Values itself so highly, that to her 
All matter else seems weak. She cannot love 
Nor take no shape nor project of affection, 
She is so self -endeared." 

Again, it creates beautiful and sweet young wo- 
men, who are its pets and darlings, yet are never 
spoiled. They are Fashion's successes, and men 
say of them : 

11 From women's eyes this doctrine I derive : 
They sparkle still, the right Promethean fire ; 
They are the books, the arts, the academies, 
That show, contain and nourish all the world." 

Fashion is at its best in the married woman, 
who directs, purifies and ennobles a large circle. 
Her power is endless. She is 

" Subtle as sphinx, as sweet and musical," 
yet generous, grand and noble as Portia ; kind to 
the young, a staff to* the old, a friend to the 
friendless ; great to her rivals, for she ignores 
them ; faithful at home, a power abroad. Who 
can measure the use, the infinite value, of such a 
woman ? 

She makes, orders, governs and holds together 
society. Around the outer edge of her noble 
sphere the married flirts may flutter and die, the 
deeply-dyed adventuress may plot and ensnare, 






308 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MAKERS. 

the envious may rage, and the malicious imagine a 
vain thing. She rises superior to them all. She 
is the queen. 

Fashion produces its worst effects when it 
makes young men effete. To see a man devoted 
to fashion and to nothing else, is to see the poor- 
est emasculation of the race. Particularly the 
form of modern effete fashion. 

" Lord Angel o is precise, 
Stands at a guard with envy, scarce confesses 
That his blood flows, or that his appetite 
Is more to bread than stone." 

It is strange where Fashion got this creature — 
this paralytic and selfish monster. There is 
something deep in the heart of all humanity that 
loves the energy, the health, the vivacity of a 
strong young man. We lovfc a lover, but he must 
be a manly one. We forgive even brutality in 
man, if it shows his strength. The errors of 
youthful blood have ever been condoned, and tho 
wildest boy has often made the noblest gentle- 
man. But the young man who has no warmth, 
no strength, who drawls and lisps, and devotes 
himself to his own pleasure, and says the weakest 
things, who is less than a girl in his brawn and 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 309 

muscle, and like a dolt in intellect — who wants 
him ? He must "be a spawn of the worst deca- 
dence of Paris, a false growth of her miasmatic 
slums of wickedness, the last result of a fashion 
which has insulted nature by the rnarriage de con- 
vcnance, and a picture of what Fashion can do 
when she aims at a failure. 

Fashion is at her best when she makes her men 
love horses, dogs and hunting, boating, games 
and swimming ; when she preaches physical cul- 
ture. It is a good thing to see a man play lawn 
tennis under a hot sun for five hours ; you feel 
that that man could storm a battery. 

Fashion does a good w r ork when she brings 



" The voice was soft, and she who spake 
Was walking by her native lake, 
The salutation had to me 
The very sound of courtesy." 

Our American young women of fashion have 
been accused of a want of the soft voice, and an 
absence of courtesy. Let both be cultivated, for 
they are invaluable. 

Fashion is not without a sense of humor, and 
loves a witty man, or, that rarer thing, a witty 



310 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

woman. It loves an easy naturalness, a suitable 
and moderated gesticulation. It does not love 
(except, perhaps, occasionally in dress) exaggera- 
tion. Indeed, the morals of fashion should in- 
clude a perfectly good taste, if there be such a 
thing. 

There are some people whose natural powers of 
voice and manners exercise an irresistible fascina- 
tion — they are always the fashion, for they are the 
stuff of which fashion should be made. To please, 
to make people feel happy, to ornament the day, 
to make a party go off well — this is the end and 
aim of the human race, whose pursuit is fashion. 

There are nobler aims. We do not pretend to 
say that there are not. A life can be better spent 
than in the pursuit of fashion. 

But we cannot ignore the power of that subtle 
influence which rules the world. We know that 
an absurd fashion in dress will come and go, and 
we shall all yield to it. We know that one year 
we wear boxes on our heads like the Japanese, 
and, the next year, wheels like the Hottentots. 
We know that we can no more bind fashion to 
our liking than can sunbeams bring flowers and 
grapes out of a stone wall. We could cause the 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 311 

clouds to snow quite as soon as we could make a 
fashion. It comes mysteriously, but powerfully, 
from some source of which we know nothing. 
Why did Queen Elizabeth dine at eleven, and 
why do we dine at seven ? Why do we wear long 
dresses one year and short ones the next ? Im- 
agine how a man in a lawn tennis suit, or a girl in 
an ulster, would have been hooted ten years ago ! 

Why is literature so different in different ages ? 
A virtuous and even priggish age tolerated a free- 
dom of expression which we cannot endure. 

The wit of one age is the stupidity of the next. 
The immortal stories of Scott, the humor of 
Dickens, the poetry of Byron, are all subject to 
the mutations of fashion. 

What is it, then ? and what are its morals ? 



312 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

CHAPTER XXV. 

SEVERAL KINI>S OF EXCLUSIVENESS. 

THE wealthy butcher, having made a fortune, 
is sure to look down on his wealthy com- 
petitor, the baker, and is not likely to invite 
him to his parties. In America this struggle 
for exclusi ven ess becomes always absurd, as one 
traces back the origin of families. 

For, although there are a few families who 
have here claim to long descent, they are now of 
little importance to the men who make them- 
selves, and an aristocracy in America must be 
one of talent or money. The man of the hour is 
the man of family. 

It is not strange, however, that amid all other 
claims to a fine society, we should put in this one 
of exclusiveness 

Mrs. Mont Blanc, for instance, wishes, of all 
things, to keep her lofty height unsullied, and 
she looks about, naturally, for the neighboring 
snowy peaks. She is richer than anybody else, 
her right to a splendid position is undoubted, 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 318 

but she cannot bear to shine alone in solitary 
grandeur. She wishes to have somebody come and 
see her splendor, to do her homage, to keep up 
the burning incense before her shrine. She 
wants an entourage of worship. Who shall be 
permitted to go and worship ? Will Mrs. Aiquille 
Vert bo good enough ? Will Miss Jungfrau come ? 
Shall she allow Mrs. Montant Vert the privilege ? 
She will not invite Mrs. Matterhorn — oh no ! for 
Mrs. Matterhorn is too high herself. She must 
not have a rival too near the throne. 

Giving so much thought and talent to the sub- 
ject, Mrs. Mont Blanc does arrive at a very aristo- 
raiic state, and her parties are considered the 
cap-sheaf of exclusive fashion. She gets much 
glory from them herself , and every one is desir- 
ous of being asked, for it is thought to be a cer- 
tificate of fashion to be seen at her parties. 

But are they agreeable? Does not the weary 
traveler come home and say: " Well, it was 
splendid, but stupid." 

Mrs. Gushingstream has another kind of ex- 
clusiveness. She wishes to be very fashionable 
and very fast. She will have nobody who would 
put a severe face on that flirting, dancing, gay 



314 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

saturnalia of hers. She does not care for Mrs. 
Mont Blanc or Mrs. Matterhorn. They bore her 
excessively. She would like one invitation a 
year to these parties, but she could not stand 
more ; it is important to her fashion that she 
should have that, but farther she careth not. 

The gay supper at Delmonico's after the theatre 
is more to her taste, and the ride on the coach, 
and the dancing party, with ail its fast men for 
partners, is her dear delight. 

Mrs. Lindenmere has another kind of exclusive- 
ness. She only wants people of talent— men who 
have done something good or great, women of 
refined and good lives. 

Mrs. Lindenmere is naturally aristocratic. 
She does like an old family name, but she 
adores talent and despises meanness. Her kind 
of exclusiveness is, perhaps, the most admirable, 
but chacun d son gout. Every man's house is his 
castle, and we cannot say a word as to the pro- 
priety of each person doing as he pleases. 

Exclusiveness, however, is sometimes only 
another name for snobbery, ill-temper and 
jealousy. 

The fashionable expert— who finds herself rich, 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 315 

the possessor of a fine house, the person who can 
give invitations— is very apt to make that position 
a mere opportunity for wreaking slights on peo- 
pie whom she dislikes. A woman who is prettier 
than herself, who cannot help attracting the notice 
of gentlemen, such a woman is always sure to be 
left out of her parties. She takes no note of 
patient merit. She invites only those who will 
benefit herself. She conducts the social policy 
as certain politicians conduct the government, 
merely seeking those friends who will advance a 
selfish popularity for herself. She has no grand 
ideas for the rest of the world. 

Exclusiveness exists in religion. The Catholic 
who speaks of the iVb?z-Catholic instead of the 
Protestant, the Close-Communion Baptist, the 
Episcopalian, who denies that any one has a 
right to translate the Bible .but himself, these are 
types, and they are strongly attractive types 
to the majority of men. They are the largest of 
all the sects. So it would seem that the exclusive 
people, both in religion and in fashion, are the 
most authoritative and the most envied. Every 
one wants to get over the highest paling, and to 
unlock the most vigilantly-closed door. 



M6 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

There is no doubt that, in a selfish point of 
view, exclusiveness helps a fashionable woman. 
It gives her a sort of dignity and worth which 
those do not have who open their doors to every- 
body. It seems to say that she is superior to 
others. On the other hand, no man or woman, or 
idea, has ever improved society or mankind if it 
represent narrowness and a small exclusiveness. 
The grand men, the great women, the bold ideas, 
have governed the world. Not alone that small 
part of it which we call society, but Church, state, 
ind literature. 

A hostess can exercise a wise exclusiveness, 
such as the celebrated Lady Palmerston described 
herself as doing, when she ' ' passed Lord Palmer- 
ston's acquaintances through a coarse sieve," 
and every hostess is bound to do this. No 
woman who entertains should ask everybody to 
her house. The very respect which she owes to 
herself and to her guests should prevent this. 
As one clever woman said once of another : " I am 
never complimented by being asked to Mrs. 
Manywether's camp." No lady should allow her 
house to be degraded -into a "camp." Such an 
-delusiveness, as that which Lady Palmerston 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 317 

showed, is the right kind for the perfection of 
society. It winnows the chaff from the wheat. 

Let us look, then, with some degree of respect 
upon those whom the world calls fantastically or 
snobbishly exclusive. There can be no more 
sure way of being sozcgld after, but, perhaps, no 
more cruel role, for the person who adopts it hurts 
more feelings than she helps; but, after all, it 
may have its uses. 

A l^dy, in entertaining, should always remem- 
ber one thing — to invite those whom she believes 
to be congenial. She should not make her parties 
either political, musical or literary, exclusively, 
but she should have a general idea of sets and of 
their tastes, and of who would like to meet who. 
Especially is this important at a dinner or a break- 
fast, where the guests must sit and talk for two 
or three hours together. There is no such ordeal 
of agreoability. To invite a vaporous, fashionable 
woman to sit next to an Oxford or Cambridge 
professor who has a speciality of which he wishes 
to talk, is to make both supremely miserable. To 
ask a young poet to sit next to an old Tabby, who 
can talk nothing but dissection of character and 
social parboiling, is to ruin his dinner at least. 



318 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

To ask . politician to sit next to an abstract phi- 
losopher is as bad as possible. 

Therefore, a woman should consider all these 
questions bsfore she begins to entertain. To 
form a salon in America is said to be impossible, 
because there are no people to whom society is a 
business, as it is in Europe, and the very people 
who could do it prefer to invite their own exclu- 
sive set. 

It is curious to observe, at every watering- 
place hotel, at every capital city, even in every 
small village, this attempt at exclusivcness. It is 
astonishing to see how it always hurts somebody 
to bo left out of somewhere. There is a very 
great tendency to a brutal assumption of one's 
social rights among our nouveau riche who imitate 
the English. 

The law of primogeniture has made the whole 
English race selfish. The power given to an 
elder son to turn his mother, and sisters, and 
younger brothers out-of-doors, when he comes of 
age, of course engenders the profoundest selfish- 
ness. It makes a privileged class who can as- 
sume to drive in before another at the Ascot 
races, throw dust with impunity, and do all sorts 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 319 

of insolent things. The poorer younger brothers 
cannot complain, because they want patronage. 

Our rich people at Newport, and at other 
places, copy this insolence too often. 

A man who has money and position here often 
thinks it an aristocratic and English thing to do, 
to insult some one less well known than himself. 
He, of course, becomes unpopular ; but it is too 
unfortunately true that, if he is called exclusive, 
there are many weak people who wish to be in- 
vited to his parties, and who will curry favor by 
submitting to insults. 

All this comes under the head of snobbishness, 
which is the undergrowth of fashion. It is the 
shadow, the toadstool, the malaria of good so- 
ciety. 

To a young person entering society we would 
commend a certain exclusiveness. It is always 
wise to choose one's friends slowly and with due 
consideration. We are not the most perfect be- 
ings ourselves ; we do not want to be intimate 
with too much imperfection. A broken friend- 
ship is a very painful thing. We should think 
twice ere we give an intimate confidence to any 
one. 



S20 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

But wo would not advise a young person to 
choose his or her friends from the worldly point 
of fashion or wealth. Try to find those who are 
good and true, honorable and generous, well-bred 
and well-educated, whoever they may be. It is, 
then, of no sort of consequence as to what exact 
shade of fashion they may be. These people are 
always good society. 

It is not at all impossible that such persons 
may be found in the realms of high fashion, for 
good company makes many virtues. Politeness, 
self-possession, fine manners sfcr&c in as well as 
out, and the gay salon shows many a glimpse of 
beautiful character. By no means suppose, that 
because some leaders of fashion are insolent, that 
all leaders of fashion arc also. But try, in all 
conditions of life, to read character first, before 
drawing general deductions, 

Exciusiveness has this advantage — it causes 
a lady to pause and to inquire into the general 
characteristics of her guests ; their moral, 
social and political standing. We use the word 
political in its largest sense. 

In spite of a determined exciusiveness, the most 
objectionable men and women get into the most 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 321 

fashionable society. It is to be feared that the 
possession of wealth is more desired than the 
possession of smy other attribute ; that much is 
forgiven to the rich man which would be rank 
heresy in the poor one. We have no such invio- 
lable virtue that we can as yet rate Dives and 
Lazarus before death, as they are rated after 
death. Dives gives too good dinners ; we enjojr 
his balls and his music. A handsome, agreeable 
guilty woman, who can sing and who can amuse 
us, is very apt to get into our parties in spite of all 
exclusiveness. 

The number of modest people who have real 
merit and who are kept out by the exclusiveness 
of society must be very large ; yet, if they have 
tact and a gift for social pre-eminence, they will 
find their way. The most certain way to please 
is to show a modest indifference to " the smiles of 
the great " (they call it patronage in England — we 
have no such ugly word here), and the surest way 
to stultify one's fashionable position is to push. 
No one likes a pusher. 

That would be an ideal exclusiveness which 
should only admit the cultivated, the good, the 
wise and the elegant. But where, then, would be 



322 THE AMERICAN CODE OP MANNERS. 

the crowded halls of Fashion? We fear that 
they would be very lonely ! It is not always the 
highest breeding in these degenerate days which is 
1 ' the fashion. ' ' The manners on the bathing beach 
at a certain well-known watering-place contra- 
dict such a belief. 

There is little exclusiveness there, and it is a 
pitiable trait of our nineteenth century manners 
that the want of modesty and reserve on the part 
of women, and the want of respect on the part 
of men, are thus openly tolerated. 



j;HE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 323 



CHAPTER XXVI. 

BREEDING, CULTIVATION AND MANNERS. 

GOOD breeding comprehends that intimate 
knowledge of all that is refined, amiable, 
befitting and elegant in manner and conver- 
sation, which comes, first, from a training at 
the mother's knee and in the father's house, and 
secondly, from an ability and desire to accept 
those refining influences which an after knowl- 
edge and interest in society will help to render 
one conventionally well-bred, according to the 
etiquette of society. 

Good breeding puts the nature under restraint ; 
it controls the temper, and tempers the speech. 
No man, who is well-bred, will swear in the pres- 
ence of ladies, or smoke, without their permission, 
in any room where they may be. Good breeding 
is the guardian angel of a woman ; in any position 
in which she may find herself, it makes the plain- 
est woman attractive, and its silent but continu- 
ous pressure encircles her like a golden or silken 



324 THE AMERICAN CODE OE MANNERS. 

net, and prevents a thousand escapades into 
which passion or feeling might hurry her. There 
are very few thoroughly well-bred women in this 
world who go astray. 

Breeding, therefore, may "be defined as the 
apotheosis of self-restraint : it prevents the hun- 
gry boy from accepting the last peach at dessert, 
it tames down the exuberant spirits of girlhood, 
it tells the ardent horsewoman not to jump that 
last fence, it modulates the laugh, and it gives 
dignity to the walk. A well-bred person is not 
loud, does not talk slang, nor is she prononcee 
in anything. A well-bred man is quiet in dress, 
respectful to everybody, kind to the weak, helpful 
to the feeble. He may not be an especially 
generous or kind-hearted man, but good breeding 
tells him that these things are within the duties 
of a gentleman. He simulates a virtue if he has 
it not, and is courteous and tender to the old, the 
feeble, the humble, or to those whom society 
taboos. "Noblesse oblige" is his motto, and his 
practice is to do that which he feels he owes to 
himself. 

A well-bred woman may take a large liberty to 
herself, as to dress, equipage and style, but she 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 325 

"will never outrage convenances (we have no English 
word to express the delicate shade of meaning 
which this French word so aptly defines). She 
will not force herself in where she is not wanted ; 
she will not push herself ; she will delicately refrain 
from accepting any civilities which she cannot 
return. She will be a lady through all the trials 
of poverty, or the greater trials of sudden and 
unexpected wealth. She will do her part in the 
social world gently, honorably, and well. No 
lady ever talks much of herself, or of her slights, or 
of her compliments. She sinks herself in others, 
tries to be as agreeable as she can, to be always 
polite, to allow no exhibitions of temper, to go 
helpfully on through life, to refrain from patron- 
izing, to negatively observe all the nuances of 
good manners, to retire gracefully if her seat is 
wanted — to be, in fact, thoughtful of others. This 
is good breeding, and the perfection of it, makes 
the lady, no matter where she is. And yet, the 
reader will observe, if this is good breeding, 
where are all the well-bred people ? 

The truth is, nothing is so rare as to see in 
these degenerate clays, truly well-bred young 
men. The sons of our best families are coarse, 



326 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

selfish and impolite, as a rule. They have not the 
air which their fathers had. They do not, appar- 
ently, respect women. This is notoriously true of 
most fashionable young men. They are not 
prone to rise and give their seats to a lady. 
They are not too particular as to their language. 
They will assume a severe and bored expression 
when a lady speaks to them. They are, in the 
vernacular of New England, hateful; in the 
language of England, they are cubs. In fact, the 
youthful bear would seem to be their prototype, 
for they can only be propitiated with sweets. To 
see such a young man at the Casino, at Newport, 
refrain from rising to give his chair to a married 
lady — his mother, perhaps ; to see him in the 
skating rink, oblivious of the fact that a lady near 
him needs some assistance which he could render ; 
to see the brutal manner in which he laughs at 
some unfortunate accident, and to notice the 
thorough selfishness which governs his conduct, 
is to finally despair of the world, and to say : 
" These young men have been brought up by 
Christian fathers and refined mothers, they have 
been sent to dancing school, they have been 
educated at college — whence, then, this dreadful 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 327 

disregard of decency ? Where is their breeding, 
where their cultivation and where their man- 
ners?" 

The answer is, they have no cultivation, and 
the "breeding which they receive at home is 
rubbed out by the selfishness of the age. The 
best mothers, in a worldly sense, are thinking far 
more of securing a rich match for their sons than 
of making them thorough gentlemen. These 
boys hear money, money, money, talked from 
morning until night. What girl can be well- 
mannered when her education tends to the neces- 
sity of catching a rich husband, in defiance of 
modesty or of morality ? The worship of wealth 
in America is injuring manner. 

At the colleges, the old fashion of study is 
almost wiped out. The men are talking of row- 
• ing, of their societies, of the ball match, the race- 
course and the opera bouffe, instead of discussing 
an ode of Horace or an essay by Macaulay. To 
talk of literature is considered affected, and the 
man who should do so is voted a muff. They 
have absolutely a term full of reproach for a 
student ; he is a " dig," and no young member 
of the fashionable club wishes to be a " dig." 



328 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

Thus cultivation, which is the very certain 
parent of good breeding, is left out of the train- 
ing of many a young man. If a man is a scholar, 
a thinker, a refined and cultivated man, breeding 
and manners will come to him, even if, like 
Burns, he has started from the plow. There are 
no books of etiquette like the classics, in all lan- 
guages. A man cannot read Latin and Greek 
and remain a boor. He cannot read Shakespeare, 
Milton, and Racine, and Moliere, and be a vulgar 
upstart. He is, if a thoroughly cultivated man, 
at least a gentleman. 

But the age being a revolutionary one, so far 
as etiquette and manners are concerned, we rau«t 
look for good breeding to a class which has not 
been corrupted by fashion, and whose wealth is 
yet to be gained. We shall find in every class in 
college some natural-born gentleman. He has a. 
good heart, he is modest, unselfish and noble ; 
he is not thinking of himself, but of that mother 
whom he hopes to support ; he is working for 
fame, for honor, and for her. In the banking 
house, in the dry goods store, in the railway 
office, in the struggling ranks of the professions, 
must we look for the coming gentleman — the man 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. U29 

who is not thinking of himself, but who is work- 
ing for some one else. 

In the ranks of society we also still find some- 
times the ideal gentleman. Society has not pro- 
duced so good a crop of young men as it should 
do ; yet its false aims, its glittering prizes, have 
not yet dazzled all men out of the true and ideal 
breeding. There is such a thing as an " admirable 
Crichton" — a man who can think, read, study, 
work, and be fashionable. He can go through 
the fierce fires of social competition and yet not 
be scorched. All men are not ignoble, nor vulgar, 
nor selfish, if the majority be. But it is not to 
be denied that the breeding of the young men of 
the fashionable world is not, to-day, the breeding 
in which their grandfathers or fathers excelled. 

Let us, however, mention that the on'icers of 
the army arid navy are almost always well-bred 
men. They have received what our young men 
all need — a repressive training. 

The young and fast girl of the period is 
the most ill-bred person possible, in a major- 
ity of cases. A flirtatious and pleasure-loving 
mother never produces a well-bred daughter. In 
fact, what chance has a daughter of such a 



330 THE AMERICAN CODE OF KCAlt'KSBSi 

mother of any goo 1 breeding ? She must fight 
for herself to obtain the beaux, her rival being 
her mother ! She finds that if she is loud, eccen- 
tric and bold, she attracts attention. To elderly 
ladies she is as insolent as a prize-fighter ; indeed, 
the carriage of these half-boy young ladies recalls 
the attitude of a prize-fighter, often. To see 
them receive or return a greeting, is to see the 
perfection of bad breeding. 

A gentleman, who had the thorough good 
breeding of the past, received a well-dowered 
and beautiful young woman into his family as a 
daughter-in-law. He was pleased with the con- 
nexion in every sense but one. 

" She has no manners," said he, after a month's 
acquaintance. " She does not bow to me on the 
stairs, or accept my proffered hand. She has no 
breeding, no cultivation, no manners. She does 
not treat the servants well ; she is insolent to my 
old sister ; she makes no effort to be agreeable to 
my guests ; and yet, I think she is kind-hearted 
enough, and means to do right. Do you know, I 
think she does not know how to be polite. She 
has no cultivation. ' ' 

He was right. His daughter-in-law knew how 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 33 i 

to ride a horse, to dance, to speak French, but 
how to be a lady she knew not. It was a language 
she had not learned. 

Now, it is easy enough to learn when and how 
to leave a card, how to behave at a dinner, how 
to dress, how to eat with one's fork, how to 
sit in a carriage, how to bow and how to courtesy, 
how to receive and how to drop an acquaintance, 
but what a varied education is that which teaches 
us to be well-bred ! Can we acquire it late in life ? 
Can we be a thoroughbred — all by ourselves ? 

Yes, by purging the nature of undue self- 
esteem, arrogance, selfishness and snobbery — by 
making the heart right. To be fascinating and all- 
conquering is not given to every one ; indeed, it 
is the privilege of the very few. But to be 
polite and well-bred is possible. Some women 
have but to smile and bow to conquer the world, 
others must study long and patiently to achieve a 
good manner. The worst manner is born of a 
coarse indifference and a self-sufficient arro- 
gance ; it is the manner which the nouveau riche 
woman assumes ; it is the perfection of igno- 
rance. She announces herself a vulgarian by 
every pompous sneer. 



332 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

Breeding, cultivation and manners come, there- 
fore, from the heart and the mind. They are not 
outward graces to he learned at the dancing- 
school. They must be festered. The dancing- 
school and books of etiquette are valuable, only as 
the grammar of the language we are learning ; they 
may assist us, cut we must furnish the material 
on which to work. The old adage, that it takes 
three generations to make a gentleman, is being 
contradicted by the conduct of many of our 
young men, who are undoing what three genera- 
lions have made. Of course, we must always 
see that race is a predominant thing. Some 
families are always surly, others are polite. 
Judge Story, an eminent jurist, was the soul of 
sweetness. His politeness was most enchanting 
and proverbial. His gifted son, Mr. Wm. W. 
Story, the sculptor, has inherited this affable and 
delightful manner. Other distinguished contem- 
poraries of his had icy and forbidding manners, 
and the frigidity and cubbiness have descended 
in exact ratio of excess, as the talent has dimin- 
ished. To have nothing left of a great ancestor 
but his bad manners is a poor inheritance. 

But the American should have the best man- 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 333 

ners in the world, for he has nothing to crush 
him. He need never be subservient, he can 
always afford to be polite. No man here knows 
a master. If another man is richer, is that any 
reason for being afraid of him ? Our richest 
people, the Astors, have ever been distinguished 
for kindly and excellent manners, generous hearts 
and a perfect breeding. It is to be presumed 
that they do not admire a snob, or any one who 
grovels ; indeed, no one loves a snob, least of all 
the man whom the snob cultivates. 

There is no possible return, perhaps, to those 
courtly bows and courtesies of the past, those com- 
pliments and those stately speeches of our an- 
cestors. The age is a different one, and yet, as 
we see some pretty old lady, who of us has not 
envied her her manners ? How graceful and 
picturesque they are ! How delicately she eats. 
What neat ways she has ; what pretty compli- 
ments she pays ; how gently and gracefully she 
moves ! She has never said a rude thing in her 
life ; her lips would be paralyzed first. Is her 
granddaughter half as agreeable, with her loud 
voice, her stride, her defiant air ? 

No ; a thousand times, no, 



334 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

And this bent old gentleman, who tries to tell 
us a good story ; to remember his past wit, to 
help a lady out of a carriage with old-fashioned 
and knightly courtesy. Is he less attractive than 
his grandson, who does not know one-third as 
much, but who assumes to know a great deal 
more than his grandpapa — indeed, the young 
cub calls the old gentleman a " buffer." Which 
is the man of breeding, and cultivation, and 
manners ? 

The manners of the past, though somewhat 
stiff and formal, had this great advantage over 
the manners of the present : they were founded 
on respect for others. 

The manners of the present are the outcropping 
of a selfish indifference. Until that feeling is 
mended, perhaps the manners never will be. 



THE AMERICAN CODE OS 1 MANNERS. 335 



CHAPTER XXVII. 

THE DUTIES OF AMERICANS TO SOCIETY. 

THE duty of an American to his own society 
is somewhat complicated. He has a Tery 
queer problem to solve. We will presume 
that Le is a traveled man, learned in all the 
foreign etiquette, able to hold his own in any 
capital of Europe, and desirous, as is every gen- 
tleman, to appear well in all— as a gentleman 
always should. He does not wish to parade his 
culture. He detests a fop, as he detests a boor ; 
they are the two disagreeable extremes w hich he 
should avoid. 

Yet he is, if he goes to Washington, as a Sena- 
tor or a Representative, to be associated with 
a man from Yahoo Territory, who is, perhaps, 
his political superior, and who will be his social 
equal. 

This man eats with his knife, picks his teeth 
with his fork, and wears a red necktie to an 
evening party, and a frock-coat in the morning. 
He uses bad grammar, conscientiously, because 



336 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

it makes him popular with his constituents, but 
excellent English in his speeches. He has that 
singular fluency which makes the American poli- 
tician the wonder and the miracle of the age ; he 
has a natural aptitude for statesmanship. No 
one can accuse Bardwell Slote, however, of any 
knowledge of etiquette, yet he, possibly, will be 
nominated as Minister to France, the very birth- 
place of etiquette. He will be invited to dine 
with the King of Belgium, one of the most ele- 
gant and enlightened of modern potentates ; he 
will go in a costume which might pass muster 
in Yahoo, but which causes His Majesty of 
Belgium to cough violently behind his handker- 
chief. 

The polished American — from Boston, we will 
say — is annoyed beyond measure if he is con- 
founded with the Hon. Bardwell Slote. He 
knows that, politically, he is his inferior. He 
cannot tell His Majesty, however, that a knowl- 
edge of knives and forks and finger bowls is as 
common to one-half of our country people as it 
is a mystery to the other half. He must bear in 
silence all the sneers and the insulting criticisms 
upon Bardwell, knowing that this particularly 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. bd( 

awkward position is now indirectly duo to the 
Declaration of Independence. 

We have had ladies in the White House who 
have insulted the people's English, and who have 
ignored Lindley Murray ; we have had foreign 
Ministers who got drunk in the streets, and 
others who raised their voices and who crowed in 
their court-yards like a cock. 

It did not appease the polished gentleman 
from Boston to hear the natives say : " Oh ! les 
AmericainsP' 1 with a shrug. 

If, by any chance, a cultivated American finds 
himself at a foreign court as a Minister, he is 
obliged to use all his diplomacy to know how to 
keep his country-people in bounds in the eti- 
quette of a strict court. The Hon. Bardwell 
Slote wishes to pick his teeth, in the presence of 
Queen Victoria, with his jack-knife. His inde- 
pendence is bumptious ; he does not intend to 
improve the etiquette of Yahoo. 

No one in the world is more thoroughly a slave 
than is such a man, who thinks himself indepen- 
dent. He is the slave of early bad habits, of a 
defective education. Should he for one moment 
think of the difference between himself and the 



338 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

cultivated man, he would see that the latter 
enjoyed far more freedom than himself, and a 
thousand privileges from which he is debarred. 
He will see that manners are the " open sesame " 
to good society all over the world. He will find 
that Bardwell Slote, with all his original clever- 
ness (that enormous cleverness, which has raised 
him from a boat hand on a Western river to the 
proud position of a Senator or a foreign Minis- 
ter), will not stand him in stead in the require- 
ments of his new position. 

He must learn how to dress himself properly, 
how to behave at a dinner table, how to speak 
elegantly to ladies— he must, in short, learn 
etiquette. 

Now, the duty of an educated and traveled 
American is, to try to disseminate this knowl- 
edge, and the duty of an uneduca/ted American 
is, to condescend to learn it. 

The etiquette of a court may be fugitive and 
vague. We have none of those tiresome cere- 
monials of which we read in the autobiography 
of Madame d'Arblay or of Cornelia Knight. 
But the etiquette of good society is universal, and 
founded on sound principles. It can be learned 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 339 

by a little study, £>:id it is always useful, although 
it is a shifting and changeful thing. The duty of 
an American to society is to raise its tone. He 
should, far from allowing his family to sink into 
carelessness of forms and of ceremonies, try to 
keep them up to the standard of the highest ele- 
gance. If his means are small, still let his table- 
cloth be clean, and his service as neat as his purse 
can buy. Let there be finger-bowls, for they are 
cleanly ; let every child be taught to eat with his 
fork, and let every one agree that at table each 
one shall be neat, orderly, agreeable and patient. 

A dfnner of herbs, with such manners, such 
attention to the realities of etiquette, will fit a boy 
or girl to afterward play his or her part well in 
any society. 

To "eat an egg out of the shell " was once a 
fop's definition of good breeding ; to break it 
into a cup was his definition of vulgarity. Our 
ancestors were very particular about these bits 
of table manners. Now they are of no conse- 
quence, so that a person with easy address 
handles his egg as if he knew what to do with 
it, and were not afraid of it. 

But it is not many years since a prominent 



340 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

American drank the water out of his finger-bowl 
at an English dinner and called it ts rather weak 
lemonade." It is not long since a gentleman de- 
clared in England "that he never got on his 
white cravat at the right time." These are 
solecisms which could be mended. 

Women are gifted with so much tact and so 
imitative a faculty that they need fewer hints 
than men. Yet they must learn when to wear 
their diamonds and when to leave them at home ; 
when to wear their finery and when to be plainly 
dressed. 

On the steamboat, ■ on the car, on the* stage- 
coach, surely camel's-hair and diamonds are out 
of place ; yet one very representative political 
lady defended her fine clothes by saying she 
" always wore them traveling, to show them." 

That is, perhaps, one of our national sins — a 
love of show ; a disdain of privacy, a very 
great ignoring of the proprieties of time and 
place. 

In the leaving of cards, the first visit, the invi- 
tation to dinner, the return of civilities, there 
should be these general rules laid down : First, 
ask what is due to others ; then, what is due 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 341 

to oneself. There is always a social conscience 
somewhere in one's organization which will 
point aright. 

Wq have endeavored in these papers to lay 
down certain rules ; we have tried to teach the 
neophyte some things which he may not have 
known "before, about the duty which every Amer- 
ican owes to society. 

But the outward performance of these conven- 
tional rules can never be thoroughly learned, un- 
less the heart be well-bred. A man must love his 
neighbor, he must refine himself, he must be 
gentle, and honest, and fair, before he can be- 
come a gentleman. 

And as for that fine old word, lady ; is a woman 
worthy to bear it, however elegant and fashion- 
able she may be, if beneath her well-defined 
bodice there beats the heart" of a foolish and 
vicious coquette ? 

Are those women ladies who have disgraced the 
American name in Paris by their pursuit of a 
coronet, no matter at what price ? 

Are those young wives who go to Europe, for- 
getting every possible duty to their husbands and 
their homes, and who become the laughing stock 



342 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

of Europe for vanity and extravagance — are they 
doing their duty to society ? 

A quaint, old-fashioned and somewhat stilted 
politeness may be laughable now, and recall the 
days of Old Grimes, who is dead, but it is very 
pretty, and sometimes it appears in the person of 
a " girl of the period," who has learned it from a 
graceful grandmother. It is attractive in a young 
man, and sometimes, though rarely, crops out in 
the manner of a young English nobleman. The 
young Italian nobility have it to perfection ; so 
have the Aiistrians, who are the best-bred people 
in all Europe. 

If our young Americans could find the juste 
milieu ! And why can they not ? 

Americans can do everything — why not this? 
Why should we not have a Code of Manners equal 
to those of the best days— let us say, of the court 
of Marie de Medicis ? To have the " manners but 
not the morals of Chesterfield" was the old fash- 
ioned definition of a gentleman. 

Why should not an American gentleman, while 
carefully learning the code of every European 
court, infuse into his correctness a certain fresh 
originality, a vivacity and wit which the old 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 345 

civilizations have lost, and with it the original 
flavor of a native-born aristocracy? And why 
should not an American woman be low-voiced, 
thoroughbred, quiet, polite, and well-dressed, 
in addition to being very original and very 
beautiful ? 

Why should she ever degenerate into fastness, 
vulgarity, slang and mannish manners ? 

Does she not feel that she owes a great duty to 
her native land ? It has made her the most 
fortunate, independent creature in the world. 
She is not like the sister of a duke, obliged to 
give up the man of her choice, because he is not 
well-born enough, and to linger out her life a 
forlorn dependent upon the grudging charity of 
an elder brother. She is not obliged to go into a 
convent, if she fails to marry, as is a poor French 
girl but too often. 

No ; an American girl can do very much as she 
pleases. She can become the most pampered of 
wives, or the most independent of spinsters. 
She can be author, artist, teacher, doctor or 
lawyer, if she think fit ; she is respected and 
received into the best society. 

Indeed, American society is very toler ait of 



344 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

eccentricity in women, and rather likes an original 
departure from the beaten track. 

But it makes a great mistake when it forgives 
horsey girls, and women who dress like men, or 
who at the sea-side go in bathing in indecent 
garb, or who come out to sit in the sand with a 
dozen men about, to secretly condemn them, 
while they pretend to admire. 

Foreigners say that modesty is not a peculiarity 
of American women. While they can say that, 
there is some fearful lack in the American Code 
of Manners. 

It is always noticed that the belle of the sea- 
side, although she enjoys the gratification of her 
vanity, is not certain of respect, or so sought in 
marriage as the quiet and retiring girl, who does 
not " suffer herself to be admired " in public. 

The American owes this duty to society : that 
he should aim at correcting all public exhibitions 
of bad manners, such as these to which we have 
referred ; for, although they may be the outcrop- 
ping of ignorance and of innocence, they do 
cause our national name to suffer. The mere 
appearances of evil should be avoided. 

To those who would say, that we are a great 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 345 

continent by ourselves, and that we should study 
to be always original, rather than to sometimes 
copy, we can only say that, while we derive our 
Shakespeare, our Milton, and ourFenelon, Moliere, 
Racine and Goethe from the Old World, we need 
not be ashamed to study those manners which 
were the growth of thousands of years of civili- 
zation and of culture. We can cull the best from 
all. 

The New World is the offshoot of the Old 
World. It has every chance to become a perfect 
tree. But no tree ever grew to perfection in the 
park, without some training. If we like the wild 
luxuriance of the forest, still, when we bring the 
elm to our plantations, we must prune its luxuri- 
ance. 

In society, in the crowd, we need les con- 
venances. They help us to keep our natures in 
check ; they make the world a fit place to live in. 
When we are exposed to the brutality of ill- 
mannered people, we learn how dangerous a place 
would the world be if there were no etiquette. 

The best book upon etiquette is that book which 
says, " Do unto others as you would that others 
should do unto you." 



346 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

Could we always stop to consider this question, 
we should need no higher glide ; but, as a second 
and lesser manual of good breeding, we must sub- 
stitute the manners of polite society, which, 
with their restraining influence, give us time to 
think. 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 347 



CHAPTER XXVIII. 

THE USE OF CERTAIN WORDS. 

IT would seem at first as if all good words in 
our old English speech, if well chosen, ought 
to be fashionable. But such is not the case. 
Genteel, for instance, although corning from 
the beautiful word, gentle, is a tabooed word. 
11 A genteel thing" is a feeble and almost vulgar 
expression, nowadays. We no longer use the 
old-fashioned combination, " beautiful lady," 
" Mr. Brown and his lady," " she is a handsome 
lady," etc. 

There can be no reason why "lady" is not a 
good word. " Lady-like " is a very appropriate 
combination. But the use of the combination 
mentioned above is almost obsolete. We are 
fond of the Saxon word " woman," now, and it 
has almost put the word "lady" out of the 
market. 

" She is a perfect lady," however, is allow- 
able. No one objects to so delicate a compli- 
ment as that. 



348 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

Use, however, the word "woman" wherever 
you can. " She is a fine woman," or a beautiful 
woman, or a good woman, or a clever woman, 
but do not say, she is a u sweet lady," or a 
" clever lady," if you can help it. 

Do not use the word "talented." The purists 
say there is no such word. Use rather the word 
" clever." It expresses all that " talented " used 
to mean to us, and is more elegant and more 
vigorous. 

Do not be profuse in epithets of an ill-judged 
approbation. Do not say " that is a sweet thing. " 
" Sweet " is a word meant to express a sensation 
of the tongue and palate. 

Still less say of anything which you enjoy at 
table, "I love it." "I love melons," "I love 
peaches," "I adore grapes" — these are school- 
girl utterances. We love our friends. Love 
is an emotion of the heart, but not one of the 
palate. 

Yv r e like, we appreciate grapes, but we do not 
love them. 

All the senses have their appropriate language. 
None of them can be equally expressed by the 
same words. We must seek propriety of epithet 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 349 

as much in describing these emotions as in ad- 
dressing our friends. 

There are minor elegancies, too, to be observed 
in the words " take " and " eat." We do not say 
now, " I take tea with Mrs. Smith to-night," but 
"I drink tea." We do not say, "I eat supper 
with Mrs. Campbell this evening," but "I take 
supper." 

Beau Brammel rebuked a lady for saying " take 
tea," by saying, "Madame, a vulgar man can 
take liberties, but one drinks tea." 

The English, who arc very particular about 
these minor rules, are very coarse in some of 
their fashions. An American girl, who was visit- 
ing in England, declared that English matrons 
and maidens speak of men, playfully, as " horrid, 
nasty, greedy things," and that people address 
each other as "you stupid old darling," and 
girl friends call each other " you nasty little 
pet." 

This use of the word "nasty," as expressing 
friendly ideas, is a new one, and cannot be suffi- 
ciently reprobated. When our English friends 
speak of a " nasty day, ' ' they quite describe a 
muddy and rainy one ; but when they pervert the 



350 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

disagreeable word to a meaning which it cannot 
have, they outrage decency. 

An English gentleman overheard an American 
mamma ask her little daughter this question : 
" Do you feel like a beefsteak ?" 

He thought it a great blunder. He said " You 
could feel miserably ; you could feel like a fool ; 
but you could not feel like a beefsteak." 

The mamma was only questioning the child's 
delicate appetite. She might have said, " Could 
you eat a beefsteak?" which would have been 
much more proper. 

^ We Americans are careless as to language. 
We do not study our phrases as we ought. These 
common friends of ours, "that" and "which," 
get misplaced. We are not sufficiently acquainted 
with our pronouns. 

To say " you was there " was once proper— we 
find it in the old writers ; now it betokens an 
excess of ignorance, " you were there " being the 
recognized form. But some persons ignorantly 
say, " I were there," which is ten times worse, as 
" you," being a plural pronoun, excuses the gram- 
matical irregularity. 

"I would have went" is another occasional 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 351 

mistake of people who have not learned their 
verbs, instead of " I would have gone." 

These mistakes can only be corrected by study 
and reading. They are not half so bad as those 
adoptions of slang which the educated make ad- 
visedly, soberly, ar::l in no fear of Lindley Mur- 
ray. Writers are always at work at the English 
language, and many say that it is at present the 
most irregular and least understood of all lan- 
guages. But, by a constant study of good models, 
and with good taste, any one may learn it. Do not 
speak slovenly English. Clear up your sentences. 
Do not drop the "g" at the ends of w T ords like 
" sitting, lying, talking and moving." That is a 
very common fault in New England. Kather 
teach yourself to speak your words " trippingly 
on the tongue." 

It is an outlook in the right direction, that now 
young ladies are taught declamation in Paris and 
at our best schools. It will correct our incorrigible 
national fault of drawhng. For some reason, the 
American diaphragm is not so strong as the Eng- 
lish one, and we need to cultivate our enunciation. 
They have to speak clear and loud to be heard 
through their own fogs. Yv r e trust too much to 



352 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

our pellucid air to carry along our fatigued, nasal, 
drawling and careless talk. 

Mr. R. G. "White says that you should say, 
"she looks beautiful," instead of "she looks 
beautifully." He is a great authority, but some 
differ from him and say, " she looks beautifully." 
The last has the sanction of custom. 

Do not be profuse of epithets in making an 
apology. A few simple words, such as " I am 
very sorry," or "I regret exceedingly to have in- 
truded upon you," are far more appropriate than 
the " Oh ! dear, I am awfully sorry," or any other 
excessive and overloaded phrases. " Oh ! have I 
trodden on your little dog's foot ? Well, then, I 
am just ready to die. I am so horribly grieved," 
said one young lady to another. 

What could she have said more, if she had 
killed her sister ? 

Always understate rather than overstate your 
emotions. The prof oundest contempt can be con- 
veyed by a negative, as the man who says of a 
plain woman, "I have seen prettier women," 
conveys more meaning than he who says, "She 
is a horrid, homely, hateful thing !" He who 
says, "That young woman is not too refined,'' 



THE AMERICAN CODE CI? MAW UERS. 353 

paints her vulgarity upon our retina as she lives. 
A woman who says of a man, " He is not over- 
burdened with politeness," gives him a bad 
character with each well-chosen word, and yet 
she has not sullied her lips with a single abusive 
epithet. " I would rather not meet him after 
dinner" is quite enough to indicate that a 
gentleman is not always prudent with his 
wine. 

And the word "gentleman," although one of 
the best in the language, should not be used too 
much. Do not say, he is a " very fine gentle- 
man," or, he is a "handsome gentleman." 
Sometimes one can say, " he is a charming gentle- 
man," of some very markedly agreeable and 
cultivated person. But say, " he is a good-look- 
ing man," "an honest man," "a strongman," 
" a graceful man," " Fin agreeable man," if you 
happen to find such a one. We no longer say, 
" Honored Sir," or " Respected Madam," as we 
begin a letter. Perhaps it would be better if we 
did. We say simply, "My Dear Sir," or, "My 
Dear Mrs. Brown," or, to a person in some 
humble capacity, as a nurse or servant, "Mrs, 
Brown." Be careful not to mix the first person 



354 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

with the third in addressing a note. Begin it as 
you intend to finish it. 

The word '•'vulgar" was formerly thought to 
mean indecent, now it simply means bad manners. 
To be vulgar is to be inadmissible to society. 
Vulgar people are low, mean, coarse, plebeian, no 
matter where the ever-turning wheel of fortune has 
placed them. A vulgar man may sit on a throne ; a 
vulgar woman may, by mistake, find herself in 
the most fashionable salon. Use the word " vul- 
gar" freely, to express your contempt of rudeness, 
of coarseness, of the loud, the pretentious and 
the intrusive. It is a good . word, and means a 
great deal. As a synonym for all that is to be 
avoided, it is a very comprehensive word. 

And, as good manners should not be put on for 
state occasions, but should be the natural gar- 
ment of every day, so should easy and elegant 
and cultivated language drop from the lips, in- 
stinctively. Of course, all people are not equally 
gifted in this respect. One child speaks cor- 
rectly at two years old ; another will not speak 
well until he is five, and, perhaps, will never be 
fluent ; but each can avoid impropriety and 
coarseness, and can avoid, in his conversa- 



THE AMERICAN CODE OE MANNERS. 355 

tion, words which have lost their place in 
society. 

A fashion has come in in regard to the good 
old phrase, " Thank you," which is now abbre- 
viated to " Thanks." This is fashionable just 
now, but it cannot be called cordial or gram- 
matical. It is as if you did your politeness up in 
a ball and threw it at the head of your friend. 
No one is hurt by a cordial " Thank you." 

The word " Good-by" is the best abbreviation 
in our language, nor can it be replaced by any 
other. We say " Farewell," " Adieu," "Au 
revoir," not often. All have a stilted sound ex- 
cept the last. Never say "Good afternoon." 
Say "Good evening" or "Good morning," if 
you choose, but, still better, say "Good-by." 

Old and middle-aged people say that there is 
now a decay in the art of conversation— that to 
talk well is one of the lost arts. No doubt this is, 
in a measure, true all over the world. It is no 
longer the fashion to tell anecdotes to be amus- 
ing ; a person is considered a prig who " sets up " 
to amuse the company. All this is very bad, but 
it cannot be helped. It is a part of the transition 
of our society from the Revolutionary period 



DoO IKE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

when intellect and culture ruled, to the present, 
when money and material prosperity are our 
gods. 

But while puns should be avoided, and long 
arguments should be avoided, and the delicate 
subjects of religion and politics should be avoided 
in mixed society, people still must talk. To chat 
agreeably of the current events, to describe a 
novel or a play, to tell a short story of some 
recent experience at a watering-place, or to talk, 
if one pleases, of poetry, of love, or friendship, or 
music. This is all an everyday matter, within 
the comprehension of every one, and, with a little 
reading and good taste, possible to all. 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. °57 



CHAPTER XXIX. 

DINNERS AND BREAKFASTS ONCE MORE CON- 
SIDERED. 

DINNER invitations should only be accepted 
from those whose acquaintance you wish 
to cultivate and keep. Some vulgar and ill- 
bred people have been known to accept a din- 
ner invitation, and to cut or ignore the kind 
entertainers afterward. It is the height of mean- 
ness, the height of vulgarity, so to do. Be 
careful to be punctual at the dinner hour, to enter 
quietly, without formality ; and, if your hostess 
does not introduce, enter into conversation with 
the person next to you. In England no one is 
introduced, but everybody talks to his neighbor. 

Fifteen minutes is the time allowed to wait for 
a tardy guest. More than that should not be 
given to the most distinguished person. 

The host can give his right or his left arm, as 
he pleases, to the lady whom he escorts, but the 
other guests should notice which arm he oilers, 
and follow his example. 



3j3 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

The host and hostess can sit at either end of 
their table, or in the middle, or mix themselves up 
with their guests, as they please. A round table, 
now so much the fashion, obliterates any neces- 
sity for a " head and foot;" but the principal 
guest must sit at the lady's right hand, and the 
principal lady guest at the gentleman's right 
hand, always. 

If introducing is the custom of the house, 
it, is polite to request your hostess to intro- 
duce you to the person to whom the dinner is 
given. 

As soon as seated, place your napkin across 
your lap, and remove your gloves. Men do not 
wear gloves now, so that they have not the 
trouble. Lay your roll at your right hand, and, if 
oysters or clams are before you, proceed to eat 
them at once. 

Now, it seems unnecessary to remind one that 
a gentleman does not crumble his bread about, 
or roll it into pills ; that he does not take his 
soup with a hissing sound ; that he does not tip 
his plate, to get the last drop of soup ; and yet we 
see these defects in table manners, often. Vege- 
tables are to be eaten with a fork. Nothing is so 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 359 

vulgar as to see peas served in a saucer and 
eaten with a spoon. 

Asparagus, on the contrary, can . be eaten with 
your fingers. The stalk is clean, and to take it 
in the nngers, and to dip the end in the melted 
butter or sauce which accompanies the vege- 
table, and which should be placed on one side of 
the plate, is entirely proper. ' 

Olives and artichokes are eaten with the 
nngers ; so are radishes and green corn. It is 
an American fashion, and a perfectly proper one, 
to eat corn from the ear at the dinner table. 

The reason for this is clear. It is the only way 
in which the incomparable flavor of the corn can 
be obtained. 

Fish is eaten with a silver fork and a bit of 
bread. Fruit is cut with a silver knife, but eaten 
with the nngers. 

While anything like haste in eating is to be 
deprecated, still it is no longer the fashion to wait 
for others, as in the olden time. Everybody eats 
his dinner as it is set before him. It is, however, 
the height of good-breeding for the hostess to 
seem to oe eating so long as one guest is still oc- 
cupied with his plate. 



3G0 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS, 

Cheese is to be eaten with fork or fingers, as the 
person chooses. Ladies in America have a strong 
objection to cheese, as a general thing, and refuse 
it. But in England a lady often takes a large 
piece, and eats it clear. There is no reason why 
a lady should not eat cheese if she likes it. 

Do not allow the servant to r^our wine for you, 
if you do not intend to drink it. It is a fertile 
source of drunkenness among servants, who al- 
ways empty the glasses after dinner. 

Toasts and the drinking of healths are now, 
luckily, out of date. Still, if an old-fashioned 
gentleman wishes to drink your health, do not 
refuse ; bow slightly and smile, and raise the glass 
to your lips. 

Finger-glasses, with a bit of orange leaf or 
lemon peel, or peppermint water dashed through, 
are now almost universal, and very great luxuries. 
After using one, wipe your fingers oh your dinner 
napkin, not on your doyley, which is meant for 
the fruit. Some very luxurious persons pass a 
gold dish, with rose-water in it, after dinner. 
TMs should be used by dipping the end of the 
napkin in it. It is a refreshing bath for the lips, 
and removes the greasy smell or taste of food. 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 361 

The mouth should always be wiped with a wet 
forefinger or napkin after eating. 

Now, we Americans are accused of using ice 
too much, although our climate demands it. 
Everywhere, however, sherry is admitted to be 
better, if cooled in an ice-cooler. Sherry is served 
with soup, and sauterne or hock with fish. 
Americans generally prefer champagne served 
after fish, with all the courses ; but red wine 
should be provided for those who like it. Red 
wine should never be iced. Burgundy and claret 
should be of the temperature of the room. 
Champagne should be frozen or "frappe " from 
the outside before dinner, as putting lumps of ice 
in the glass ruins it for the gourmet. It destroys 
the flavor of good wine to put in lumps of ice. 

The glasses are removed by the waiter, when 
the crumb-scraper goes round, and madeira and 
sherry glasses set for the dessert. 

Port, when passed with the cheese, is left on 
the table with the sherry and madeira, and 
each guest helps himself after the servants have 
helped once ail round. This is the moment for 
story-telling, for the best talk, for the " give and 
take " of conversation. 



332 TIIE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

Kemember always, in giving a dinner, that 
some of the most agreeable are those which are 
the least expensive. 

It is quite indispensable that a gentleman 
should always be in a dress coat and white 
cravat, black suit throughout, for a seven o'clock 
dinner. 

After dinner it is now the custom to serve 
coffee and tea in the drawing-room, as long 
sitting at table fatigues everybody. 

If you commit any errors at the dinner table, 
such as tipping over a glass of red wine, breaking 
a dish, dropping a knife or a fork, or, worse still, 
upsetting a dish into your lap, try to be com- 
posed. Motion to a servant to bring you a 
napkin, but do not take too much notice of your 
own blunder. Be absolutely deaf and blind to 
the blunders of others. The dinner table is the 
most ceremonious place in the world, and, at 
dinner, etiquette reigns supreme. 

But etiquette does not mean stiffness. There 
must be an ease, a cordiality, and a grace and 
good breeding, which makes all the machinery 
work easily. 

Now, breakfasts are very different meals. 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 363 

here it is proper for gentlemen to jump up, cut 
a piece of ham at the side-board, and wait upon 
the ladies themselves, dismissing the servants, so 
that conversation may be free. Gentlemen come 
in lawn tennis or hunting suits ; ladies in morn- 
ing dresses. 

When the breakfast becomes dejeuner d la four- 
chette, or a luncheon, at 12 or 1 o'clock, the eti- 
quette becomes a little more marked, of course. 
Bouillon is served in cups and saucers, and dishes 
like sweetbreads, rissoles, cutlets, fried potatoes, 
game, pale defoie gras, fruit and coffee, complete 
this mid-day dinner. It is a favorite form of en- 
tertaining at Newport, and is much liked by gen- 
tlemen, as it saves them the gene of evening 
dress. 

Breakfasts are rapidly becoming the fashion, 
too, in New York and Washington, as people get 
more and more in the habit of taking a cup of 
tea in their bedrooms, working until twelve, and 
then emerging for the day. 

On Sunday, as most families give their servants 
the afternoon, and have an early dinner and tea, 
the gentlemen are permitted to wear frock-coats 
in the evening, and to regard the day as an 



364 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

" off " one, unless they are invited to some grand 
dinner, when they must, of course, dress. 

Breakfasts in England are considered very de- 
lightful, because of their utter informality and the 
absence of ceremony. Wedding breakfasts are an 
exception to this general informality, for they are 
ceremonious. Wines are served with salads, 
salmon, game, tongues, hams, potted meats, jellies, 
ices and fruit. It is, indeed, but the usual table 
which forms the supper at a ball. Here people 
gather around and are requested to help them- 
selves, or allow the waiters to attend to them. 
Tea and coffee are not served at a wedding break- 
fast. 

The family breakfast tabic should be made very 
attractive. Flowers should be placed everywhere, 
in summer. The napkins, silver and glass and 
china should be spotless ; the butter should be 
golden, the honey fragrant and lino, and the fresh 
roils delicious, the coffee clear and the tea strong. 
Fruit should be served when in season ; berries 
and cream, peaches and cream, and all the hot 
cakes. Broiled chicken, fried eggs, beefsteaks, 
v. Inch our omnivorous people demand should be 
had for the asking. Finger-bowls should be 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 365 

within i each, and the favorite beverage, ice-water, 
should be particularly attended to. In our very 
prolific fruit seasons, to begin with a melon 
and to end with a peach is a good " Alpha and 
Omega." 

Sidney Smith liked breakfast parties because, 
he said, "no one was conceited before one 
o'clock !" 

Morning dress should be faultlessly clean and 
neat, but simple, and utterly ungarnished with 
jewels. Young girls in white, and with hat and 
feather, are always pretty. Elderly ladies can 
wear quiet silks, or the admirable cashmere, or 
even white muslin, if made becomingly. 

But, at breakfast, rich and rustling silks, dia- 
mond rings and ear-rings are in the worst taste. 
Artificial flowers are detestable. Elaborate coif- 
fures are out of place at breakfast. At home a 
peignoir, or loose robe, is proper at breakfast, but 
not at a watering-place. 

Thick boots, Balmoral stockings, qants de Suede 
and short dresses are proper fo± a breakfast 
party. 

Per fames should never be used in the early 
morning. Cologne water alone is allowable on 



3C6 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS, 

the handkerchief, and the indefinable odor of 
cleanliness. 

Worsted or cotton gloves are never permissible, 
except on the hands of a servant. Silk gloves 
are now fashionable ar_G very refined, particu- 
larly with long arms to them. Men, as we have 
said, are always ungloved, save in riding or driv- 
ing. Colored shirts and flannel shirts are worn 
in the morning, often until the dinner hour, in 
summer, and it is proper to go to an informal 
breakfast in the informal dress of the tennis 
ground. 

But for a formal luncheon a man must 
dress himseli: in black frock-coat, colored neck- 
tie, and gray or drab trowsers, and with, of 
course, a white shirt. A kettledrum, a wedding, 
a day reception, all call for this same costume. 
Garden parties, too, demand the same dress. 

Men now wear, for riding in the Park, this 
same costume, also corduroy, boots, felt hat and 
cut-away coat; for lawn tennis, flannel shirts, 
rough coats, knickerbockers, long gray woolen 
stockings and string shoes. 

No man should ever put on a dress-coat by 
daylight in this country. It is the fashion in 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 36? 

Paris to wear them at morning weddings and on 
New Year's Day and visits of ceremony ; but her?, 
never. 

Showy shirt-fronts, jeweled studs, perfumes, 
rose-colored vests, too much of any sort of orna- 
ment — these mark the cad ; as simplicity, neat- 
ness and fitness mark the gentleman. Avoid 
brilliant cravats and shiny hats and flashy waist- 
coats, as much as you would avoid indifference 
or inattention to propriety. The juste milieu is 
the thing. 

If the dinner and breakfast and lunch are un- 
derstood, there seems to be but two or three 
little things left for us to consider further. 



B63 THE AMERICAN CUBE OF MANNEBS. 

CHAPTER XXX. 

TEAS, HIGH TEAS AND CALLS. 

AFTER an invitation to a formal breakfast 
or luncheon, a call is quite as much de 
rigueur as after a dinner, but is rot required 
after a "tea at five o'clock." 

That is a form of entertainment which means 
to dispense with formal etiquette and to save 
time. A lady or gentleman who chooses to ac- 
cept the invitation thus tendered has made his 
call ; he need not make another. Nor need a 
lady do more than leave her card on the day of 
the tea ; her duties are then over for the season, 
unless a dinner invitation follows. Dinner in- 
vitations demand a speedy call. 

But life would be a sorry burden did every five 
o'clock tea involve a call afterward, as well as 
the original visit. 

Five o'clock teas should be marked by the 
absence of any other refreshment than tea, thin 
sandwiches and cake. If even chocolate and 
punch are added, there is no longer an excuse for 



TEE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. Z63 

calling it a " five o'clock tea." It has become a 
reception. 

The original five o'clock tea arose in England, 
from the fact that gentlemen and ladies, before 
they dressed for dinner, met to take the slight 
refreshment of a cup of tea, and to perhaps in- 
dulge in a little chat. Like everything informal, 
it became very popular, and came over to Amer- 
ica as an English fashion of entertaining. The 
tsa-kettlc here, however, became a floral deco- 
ration, and the live o'clock tea a party. 

This has confused people- as to the etiquette of 
leaving a card afterward. But we assure the 
doubtful, that neither is the invited guest required 
to call again, nor is the lady of the house required 
to call on those who conic to her five o'clock tea. 
Her card invitin j them has entirely served the 
jiurpose. 

There are entertainments, known as "high 
teas," which do necessitate a call. These are 
usually given on Sunday evenings in cities ; but 
at watering-places, or at country places, or in 
small rural cities, they take the place of dinners. 
They are very pretty entertainments, and great 
favorites in Philadelphia. It is an opportunity 



870 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

for the hostess to show her beautiful cut-glass, 
to get out her preserves, to offer her hot rolls, 
scalloped oysters and delicate fried chicken. 
Berries and cream, and all sorts of delicate 
dishes, appear at the high tea, which would be 
lost at dimier. The hostess sits behind her silver 
salver and pours the coffee, tea or chocolate her- 
self. It is only fair to say, that this meal is a 
greater favorite with ladies than with gentlemen, 
the partridges, mushrooms on toast, pdte de foic 
gras, and delicately-sliced cold ham, belonging, in 
the masculine mind, either to breakfast or lunch, 
and needing wine to wash them down. But 
young ladies who drink no wine are devoted to 
high teas. The invitations are always written as 
to a dinner, as only a limited number can be 
asked. 

In the country these high teas are delightful, 
and, coming after a long drive or a picnic, with 
the solid accompaniments of a beefsteak and a 
baked potato, are very popular. Waffles and hot 
cakes, honey and maple molasses, all the Ameri- 
can dishes, a~c popular at this meal, which has 
no prototype in England or on the Continent. 

It is doubtful whether the high tea will ever 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 87 J 

be popular in New York, where it conflicts with 
the custom of seven o'clock dinners. People find 
them antagonistic to digestion — it is a violent. 
change of living. Tea and coffee taken in the 
evening keep many people awake, a single little 
cup of black coffee, which helps digestion, being 
the only stimulant that most Americans can en- 
dure of the " beverages which we infuse." 

Some ladies, who give three receptions, choose 
to have a " buffet " entertainment. Frozen cof- 
fee (a delicious refreshment), cold birds, meat 
pies, salads, salmon, various kinds of punch, 
biscuits, and, perhaps, jellies, ices and Charlottes 
standing where the guest can go and help him- 
self. One or two servants can serve such a table , 
it is less trouble than the hot oyster style of 
thing, and even the serving of tea is more oner- 
ous. It has the advantage, too, of. being scent- 
less ; while hot oysters, served in the house, in- 
variably fill the house with odor. Perhaps as 
elegant a tab^e as is needed is one where iced 
tea and coffee, cold game and salad, and punch, 
with pdie de fo'.e sandwiches, stand invitingly 
ready through the three hours' reception. 

On very cold days, hot tea and bouillon are, how- 



872 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

ever, eagerly sought for by the shivering ladies 
who go from house to house. 

No formal calls are made in America on Sun- 
day. A gentleman must have a lady's permission 
to call on that day. In Europe it is very differ- 
ent. The opera is never so fashionable as on 
Sunday evening ; dinners are always given, and 
Sunday is especially a fete day. But in America, 
all dinners and teas are informal on that day, 
and generally confined to the members of one's 
family. 

Now, all books of etiquette have a chapter on 
"Cards" and card leaving, but no two of them 
agree. Young men— who, in America, are ex- 
tremely remiss in social duties — are told in one, 
that, if they send their cards by post, they have 
requited the hospitality of the lady who invites 
them. This is far from being the opinion of the 
best ladies in society. If a lady has time to invite 
a gentleman to dinner, and he comos, he should 
certainly find time, either to call, in person, on 
her reception day, or on some evening. It is not 
enough that he should send a card by post. The 
only person who is excused for sending a card by 
post is he who is suddenly called on to leave 



town, or some ono who is, by the death of a rela- 
tive, thrown into mourning. 

A modern writer on etiquette has the following 
rather plain talk : 

" The properly- trained youth does not annoy 
those next to whom he sits by fidgeting in his 
chair, moving his feet, playing with his bread or 
with the table equipage. Neither does he chew 
his food with his mouth open, or talk with it in 
his mouth. His food is not conveyed in too large 
or in too small quantities to his mouth. lie 
neither holds his head as ereet as a ramrod, nor 
does he bury his face in his plate. He handles 
his knife and fork properly, and not ' overhand ' 
as a clown would. He removes them from the 
plate as soon as it is placed before him, and he 
crosses them, side by side, when he has finished '•' 
(Here we differ. The modern youth lets his knife 
and fork alone, except when he is conveying food 
to his mouth with them, or should do so), "and 
not before, as this is a sign which a well-drilled 
butler observes for returning the plate (?). He 
dees not leave his coffee or tea spoon in the cup. 
He avoids using his hen Ikerchief unnecessarily, 
or disgusting those near him by trumpet-like per- 



3T4 THE AMERICAN CODE OE MANNERS. 

formances with it. He does not converse in a 
loud tone, nor indulge in uproarious laughter. 
If he breaks an article, he is not profuse in 
apologies, but shows his regret in his face and his 
manner rather than in words. Tittlebat Titmouse, 
when he broke a glass dish, assured his hostess 
that he would replace it with the best in Lon- 
don !" 

This is good, strong writing, and undoubtedly 
would have been useful to the Roger Chaw- 
bacons of the fifteenth century. But we can 
hardly suppose that many young men would, in 
the present day, need these very practical hints. 
The age is beyond them. 

The great want of all our youns people is that 
spirit of respect which is the foundation of all 
breeding, and without which no formulas of good 
manners are worth much. 

When a young man sits, and allows a lady to 
stand, when he indulges in loud, brutal laughter 
after she has spoken to him ; when he refuses to 
do these acts of courtesy which were the Alpha 
and Omega of chivalry ; when he accepts atten- 
tions from ladies in society, and makes no re- 
sponse, he is a more tinlicked cub than he who 



THE AMERICAN CCXDE OF MANNERS. 375 

puts his knife and fork on the table-cloth, or who 
drinks water from his finger-bowl. The one 
makes a mistake of ignorance, the other sins in 
the face of knowledge and of light. 

There are yonng men in our fashionable society 
who try to make themselves of importance by 
being rude and insolent. They have neither con- 
science, nobility nor culture. Their reign is not 
long. 

All people should learn to reply quickly to their 
invitations, to keep their social engagements, and 
to avoid snobbery, slang and scandal. ^ Young 
ladies should learn, net only to talk well, but to 
listen well. Interruption of the speech of others 
is a great sin against good breeding. Never allow 
your eye to stray abroad while talking with a 
friend or a new acquaintance. Always speak a 
person's name fully and frequently. Instead of 
saying "How de do, Captain," say "How do 
you do, Captain Absolute.'" Always give a for- 
eigner his title. Say " Yes, Mrs. Brown," if you 
are conversing with a lady older than yourself. 
" Yes, ma'am/' " Yes, sir," arc now rather pro- 
vincial and old-fashioned. * 

If a lady invite you to a ball, call as soon as 



370 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

practicable after accepting her invitation , and 
never fail, when at the ball, to be presented to the 
host ; and, if possible, ask the young lady of the 
house to dance with you. If the lady of the 
house has a reception day, always call on that 
day. 

Avoid all quarrels and altercations in public. 
Two men who quarrel at a ball both insult their 
entertainers. Young men who abuse the hospi- 
tality of their entertainers and drink too much at 
supper are recommended to mercy, but their 
record is not a favorable one. " The Man in the 
Club Window" says: "Be careful of what you 
do and what you say, and how you dance, after 
supper." 1 

There are a set of married women in New York 
who arc injuring society very much. They rather 
pride themselves on taking too much champagne, 
and. consequently, growing vulgar, noisy and 
risque after supper. To them we should say : 

" You are undoing the effect of the civilization 
of eighteen centuries. To you the young woman 
is looking up; to you the young man is com- 
mended as to a lofty ideal. You are debasing 
yourself and lowering the tone cf society." 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 377 

Such women should never be invited but once. 

There is a belief on the part of young men, that 
they should never leave a lady standing alone 
when they have once begun to talk to her ; such 
a rule spoils many a young man's evening, and 
no right-minded, well-educated, delicate woman 
desires that a man should consider her a bore or 
a drag upon him. She should, therefore, give him 
an opportunity to leave her. Nothing can be 
more uncomfortable to a girl than to see that a 
man is talking to her and secretly hoping some 
one shall come along to relieve him. Possibly, 
too, she may desire the society of some one else 
as much as he does. It is well for a young lady 
to say, in such a case, " Will you take me to a 
seat?" or else, ''Do not stand talking to me, I 
beg of you — I do not mind standing alone ;" or, 
with a bow and smile, gracefully turn away and 
release a young man ; he will always like her the 
better afterward. 

But pretty American girls have not much 
trouble of this kind. Married ladies can always, 
with graceful tact, give a young man his conge 
and say, u Ah ! I know you want to go and dance, 
do not let me detain you." In society it is net 



378 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

considered a rudeness to leave after a few remarks 
have passed. There should be a constant inter- 
change of civilities. After a gentleman has said 
a few words to a lady, he should, if another gen- 
tleman comes up, make a bow and leave. No 
gentleman should ever intrude himself on a 
marked tCte-d-tite, and no man of honor will 
stand and listen to a conversation in which he is 
not included. If men could get over their dread 
of being " cornered," they would be twice as 
agreeable at balls as they now are. No man 
should make himself too officious at a ball, or 
annoy a lady by sticking too closely to her. If he 
does, she has a right to facilitate his departure 
by looking rather distraite, and letting him see, by 
her manner, that he is taking up too much of her 
society. 

In inviting people to a large ball, it is always 
safe to invite twice as many as you expect, such 
is the percentage of those kept away by illness or 
accident. In inviting to a reception at a small 
house, the avoidance of a crowd being an object, 
allow the absence of one-third ; that is, if you 
want seventy-five, invite a hundred, and so on. 

In England a ball-room acquaintance seldom 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 379 

goes any further, until they have met more than 
once. In America, if the gentleman is properly 
introduced to- the young lady's mamma or 
chaperon, it is proper for her to ask him to call, 
if she wishes to make his further acquaintance. 

Gentlemen, however, who are merely introduced 
to a lady at a ball, for the purpose of dancing, 
must wait for the lady to recognize them the next 
time they meet. They are at liberty to recall 
themselves by lifting their hats as they pass, but 
must not go further. A young man, on a first in- 
troduction, should not ask the lady to dance but 
once, unless she gives him every encouragement. 

Nothing can be more underbred than for the 
young lady of the house to devote herself to her 
own amusement at her own ball. She should, on 
the contrary, attend to all her guests and sec that 
they have partners, if she can obtain them. Nor 
should the young men of the house devote the 
whole evening to one young lady. They should, 
on the contrary, in their own house, endeavor to 
make it agreeable to all their guests. 

Invitations for a ball should be sent out from 
ten days to two weeks in advance, and always 
a:: s were d i mmedi at el v. 



BPO THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

CHAPTER XXXI. 

A FEW LAST WORDS ON ETIQUETTE. 

IT is a hard thing to finish off any book, par- 
ticularly one which opens up, as this does, 
new avenues of thought perpetually, as one tries 
to tread the broad path at first marked out. 

The questions which have been put by the kind 
readers of our various chapters, as they have ap- 
peared in The American Queen, will, however, 
be glanced at in this chapter with the hope t,hat 
our response may help some one out of a difficulty. 

One asks for instruction as to the letter of intro- 
duction. 

On entering a strange city — London, for in- 
stance — with letters of introduction, a gentleman 
takes a cab and drives to the address of the peo- 
ple to whom he brings letters, and leaves them, 
with his card, on which his address is fully 
stated. 

Ke must then wait until he receives a card in 
return before he makes any further advance. 

In England the greatest attention is always 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 381 

paid to letters of introduction. The bearer is 
almost always invited to dinner, and receives 
other attentions. 

For this reason many gentlemen in America, 
who are well received in England, hesitate to 
give letters, as it is an almost certain demand 
upon the host. 

In this country people are singularly inatten- 
tive to letters of introduction, which is a very 
great rudeness. 

However, when the letter is delivered, the person 
who bears it has no possible redress, if the person 
who receives it does not notice it. With many 
ladies in New York, who have position and influ- 
ence, the right of giving letters has been much 
abused. Thus, a man who has but a very slight 
acquaintance, will introduce to Mrs. Oldneid a 
person who wishes to get music scholars, or who 
needs help in some way, and this person, once in 
possession of Mrs. Oldfieid's house and valuable 
time, will abuse both. It is this inherent wrong 
in the introducer which has rendered the letter 
of introduction so great a bore. 

But, if a lady receive a letter from a friend 
whom she values, she should lose no time in 



o82 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

sending for or calling on the introduced, a simple 
permission to call on herself being all that is 
necessary in return. 

Many letters have asked about calls and cards, 
which have been fully answered, one would think, 
in the chapter devoted to that subject. How- 
ever, a few more hints can be given. 

Calling hours differ in the different cities. 
From two to five is, however, a period in which 
a call can be made in all. Among intimate 
friends early morning informal calls are proper, 
but the stranger can never presume to call before 
two. Many ladies who are busy, and wiio desire 
very much to have some time to themselves, deny 
themselves to guests on every day but one day in 
the week. 

It is easy to ascertain the hours of a city before 
calling, and, where early dinners are the custom, 
the call must be made after dinner. It is a great 
mistake that we have no national dinner hour. 

Ladies in cities dress with great elegance for 
the formal call. Dark velvets and furs, in win- 
ter, and a dress bonnet are the ordinary adorn- 
ments. Light silks and showy things are in the 
worst possible taste. In summer there is always 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. <j13 

a relaxation of ceremony. Gentlemen wear, for 
calling, their usual morning dress— a frock coat, 
gray trowsers, black cravat, or even those rough 
garments which have of late been so fashionable. 

The French fashion of leaving cards without 
inquiring for the lady is proper, but it is not 
popular in America. To ladies, whose visiting 
circle is small, such, a proceeding seems very 
heartless ; to these whose circle is immense, and 
whose time is occupied, it is sometimes impera- 
tive. 

It is, however, one of the uses of the book of 
etiquette to explain that the card is a visit, and 
can be returned, and should be received as an 
attention. 

A lady should always rise to receive her visit- 
ors, and should extend a hand. It is the Ameri- 
can custom, and any other style of reception 
seems cold. A w T ell-bred lady pays equal attention 
to all her callers, particularly to those whom she 
knows the laast, and who might be hurt by her 
inattention. 

It is not customary to introduce the residents 
of the same city. Strangers should be intro- 
duced, but ladies who sit near each other can 



3j4 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANJCEBS. 

well afford to speak to each other, and to be 
polite and agreeable to both hostess and guest. 

The new customs of reception days, and rive 
o'clock teas, are meant to save labor and to make 
all various interests harmonize. 

In the frequent event of an exchange of calls be- 
tween two ladies who have not met, they should 
take an early opportunity to speak to each other. 
The younger should seek the elder, or the one who 
has received the first civility should speak first. 
Ladies who know each other by sight should bow 
after the first exchange of cards. 

Both ladies and gentlemen, in making the first 
calls of the season, should leave one card each at 
ali the houses where they call, even if they find 
the lady at home. This is to help the lady, who 
makes these cards her memoranda for returning 
her visits. Young men should particularly leave 
cards and addresses, as a lady often wishes 
to invite them informally, and desires their ad- 
dress. 

When an invitation to a house is received for 
the first time, very polite and formal people call 
and leave a card the next day, to show their appre- 
ciation of the civility ; but this is optional. In 



THE AMEBIC AN CODE OF MANNERS. £85 

sending a first invitation, the card of the head of 
the family should always be enclosed, if to a gen- 
tleman ; if it is to a family, the card of the host 
and hostess must bo enclosed. 

After a first invitation, cards must be left in 
person, whether the invitation was accepted or 
declined. The only excuses for sending them by 
post arc illness or mourning. 

After visiters leave the room, it is in the worst 
possible taste for a hostess to discuss the char- 
acter or belongings of her guests, nor should 
she allow others, in her presence, to discuss 
them. 

Gentlemen should not expect to receive invi- 
tations from ladies, unless they have called upoa 
them, or, at least, have sent a card by some friend. 
A mother generally leaves her sons' cards, a wife 
her husband's ; and almost all young gentlemen, 
if they have not time to call, can get some friend 
to leave a card. A first call, as has been said, 
should be returned within three or four days. 
Young men should call on each other. The lady 
of society who has sons should impress this fact 
upon them — that our friendships, as Dr. Johnson 
once ^aid, must be kept in constant repair. 



380 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 

Women do so much of the work of society in 
America, that men are becoming very careless of 
these little matters of etiquette. 

It seems almost an insult to suggest to any 
young man or woman in America, that they 
should not make a rattling noise on the dinner 
table with their fingers ; that they should not 
use the toothpick too conspicuously ; that they 
should not clean their nails outside of their dress- 
ing room ; that they should not take hold of peo- 
ple when addressing them ; that the human body 
is sacred, and should not be elbowed, shoved, or 
clapped on the back ; that elbows should not be 
put on the table ; that whispering in company is 
not good manners ; that staring is in bad taste ; 
and that it is vulgar to hide the mouth, when 
smiling, with the hand. All these essentials of 
good-breeding should be taught in the nursery ; 
and most people of tact refrain, instinctively, from 
all that is rude or coarse. 

But still, as we have said, good manners seem 
to be the privilege of the few, and we sometimes 
observe, in fashionable circles, a coarseness and a 
brutality, which is utterly and entirely worthy of 
the stable-yard and barroom, 



THE AM E KIC AN CODE OF MANNERS. 38? 

41 Disrespect is an unpardonable vulgarity,'' as 
eays a worthy writer. 

One of the "disputed points of etiquette" is 
this : A iady gives a ball or a reception, and some 
one of her friends finds herself left out. 

She naturally does not call, or make any 
sign, after this, and is, perhaps, hurt and of- 
fended. 

Now the first lady has sent a card and it has 
been lost ; who shall ever tell her that the second 
lady never received it ? 

Many friendships are impaired in this way, and 
both ladies are angry, and are, perhaps, made 
enemies for life. 

For the lady who gave the ball says : " How 
rude Mrs. Oldfield was not to respond to my in- 
vitation. " 

Mrs. Oldfield is in the awkward position of not 
knowing whether she was invited or not, and no 
lady likes to seem offended at such a slight, for it 
may be that the lady who gave the ball needed 
room, and so did not invite all her friends, etc. 
The trouble grows. It is well for the mutual 
friends of the two ladies to find out these* circum- 
stance and to make the peace. 



33S THr. AMERICAN CODE OF MAJSKERg. 

But, alas ! society rather foments quarrels 
than clears them away. 

Servants often do their employers great in- 
justice. They give wrong messages ; they are 
uncivil at the door ; they miscarry notes ; they . 
deny one person and admit another ; they are 
very apt to lie. The mistress of a house cannot 
always, with the best intentions, prevent these 
accidents from occurring. She must, however, 
do her "possible, 1 ' as the French say. A servant 
is very apt to take his tone from his employers, and 
be respectful if they are cordial, and insolent if 
they are insolent. 

A gentleman has written to know when and 
where a man may wear his hat. 

He may wear it at a garden party, in a draft 
at all assemblies in the open air, and in picture 
galleries and places of public promenade, at a 
smoking, beer-drinking summer concert. He 
should, however, lift it in passing a lady on a 
hotel staircase, lecture or conceit-room, or thea- 
tre. Some men, standing, hold their hats in their 
hands while talking to a lady in the street ; but 
this is superfluous. 

A man should always lift his hat if a lady 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS, 389 

hands him a note, a bunch of flowers, an um- 
brella — anything which she may wish him to de- 
liver to another. 

Tact will generally decide this question. If a 
gentleman is in doubt, and wishes to put on his 
hat so that he may not take cold, he need only 
say, " I beg your permission to resume my hat," 
and any real lady will excuse him. 

Formerly it was the custom for a wife to take 
her husband's arm on entering a room ; but that 
is now considered old-fashioned. The lady enters 
first, the gentleman following with his crush hat 
in his hand. 

A good memory for names and faces is a price- 
less possession in society, but all have it not, and, 
therefore, after cultivating it and failing, do not 
be afraid to confess your failing and ask for a 
person's name. Do it so politely that he cannot 
feel offended. Every one should have the proper 
self-respect to le aware that this is not personal 
to himself or herself. 

Only the snobbish, the pretentious and the ig- 
norant frequently take offense ; the good, the 
sensible and the modest are seldom offended. 

Do not, in theatre or concert-room, point with 



390 THE AMERICAN CODE OP MANNERS. 

the finger at any person whose locality you wish 
to indicate ; it gives great offense. 

To ask an artist for a ticket to his concert ; 
to indicate that you wish for a permit to go and 
see an exhibition which has to be paid for ; to 
beg for invitations ; to suggest that a gentleman 
should hire a carriage for you — all these belong to 
the social marauder, the social gouge, whose 
character we have sketched elsewhere. 

It is in bad taste for Americans to adopt the 
coronets, liveries, cockades, of the foreign nobil- 
ity for their servants. Let every family have a 
decent livery of their own for their servants, if 
they wish, but never steal the coat-of-arms, or the 
colors, or the coronets, of those families who, 
perhaps, earned them a thousand years ago by 
their valor. We have our own nobility, our own 
coat-of arms— we need not steal. 

The matters of raising a veil, or of pulling off 
a glove, on entering a house, have become obso- 
lete. It is a personal thing with each individual, 
now, as to the treatment of his or her own dress. 

On the subject of bows and salutations we 
have been explicit ; but still, it appears, there arc 
questions. We can only add, that a gentleman, 



THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNERS. 391 

when walking or driving with a lady, should bow 
when any one bows to her, lifting his hat from 
his head. It is civility, also, to return a bow, 
even if you do not know who is bowing to you. 
A bow does not necessitate an after acquaint- 
ance, but to neglect to return it marks a churlish 
ill-breeding. 

A bow should not be accompanied by a grin 
or a broad smile, unless the parties are very well 
acquainted ; and yet, says an English author, 
"you should never bow to a friend without a 
smile in your eyes." 

A gentleman, on meeting a lady in the street, 
should offer to carry her mantilla, or her parcel, 
if she will„allow him to do so. 

In ascending a staircase, the gentleman shouid 
go up first, and not with, or after, the lady. It is 
optional, in the street, whether the right arm or 
the left be offered, if an arm is offered at all. 

In regard to the etiquette of mourning, we have 
had many inquiries. 

We can only reiterate, that an early call is 
proper, as showing feeling. A card left in per- 
1 son, a note written to the afflicted, is always in 
the best taste, if it express the purest sympathy. 



392 THE AMERICAN CODE OF MANNER3. 

As for congratulatory visits, and the cards and 
notes written after the engagement, or the wed- 
ding, these must be left to the instinct of the 
individual. 

Remember, however, that every kind expres- 
sion of your sincere good- will will be a very 
delightful souvenir to the young couple who are 
starting on an adventurous journey. 

And in this last fragmentary chapter, in which 
we have tried to answer the myriad questions 
addressed to us, let us add the hope that we have, 
in this little book, touched the key-note of good- 
breeding, and that we have made manifest the 
fact, that the best guide to fair manners is an 
honest and a good heart, » 



INDEX 



Accomplishments of Young Men, 217. 

Acquaintances— How to Make, 51 ; When to Cut, 
101. 

Adventurers and Adventuresses, 27, 137. 

Affectation of Speech and of Foreign Manners, 
247. 

Americans Abroad— Conduct of, 132-137, 144; As- 
sumption of Rank, 15G ; Young- People in Europe, 
341-343. 

Artificial Observances, 22S, 229. 

Ball-room Etiquette, 93, 37G-379. 

Bathing— Necessity of, 26, 37. 

Breakfasts, 283 ; Of Different Nations, 283, 284 ; 
Etiquette of, 362, 365. 

Breeding— Meaning of Good, 323-325 ; Real and 
Conventional, 219-224; Where to Look for Good, 
329 ; In Foreign Cities, 224 ; Sins Against, 374 ; 
How Acquired, 331-333 ; Bad Manners of Fashion- 
able Young Men, 326 ; Fast Young Women, 329. 

Calls— Length of, 22 ; Who Should Call First, 97 ; 

When Returned, 187; Hours for, 191, 332; Eti 

quette of, 383. 
Cards— Etiquette of, 22, 182-186, 190, 340, 372, 383 ; 

Wedding, 125, 126, 130; Of Condolence, 130,. 189; 

P. P. C, 186. 



394 INDEX. 

Chaperons— Necessity of Having, 25, 34, 38. 
Cities— Characteristics of Different, 288-293. 
Cleanliness, 228-220. 
Clubs— Etiquette of, 29. 

Conduct— In a Crowd, 107-113; In Society, 113-116- 
At Watering-places, 1G8, 191 ; Of Some Famous 
People, 156, 157. 

Conversation — Art of, 355. 

Cosmetics and Personal Decoration, 36. 

Cultivation— Lack of, 327, 328. 

Debuts, 32^3. 

Dinners, 49, 53, 58, 357 ; How Served, 61 ; Bills of 
Fare, 65, 69; Things to be Remembered by Host- 
ess, 62, 65 ; Etiquette of, 70-75, 357-362 ; State, For- 
mal and Famous, 71-79. 

Disrespect to Parents, 138. 

Dress— Gentlemen's, 22-24, 26, 210, 368, 388; Ladies', 
35, 89, 365 ; Mothers' in Comparison with Daugh- 
ters', 240 ; Ethics of, 230 ; Etiquette of, 236 ; For 
Calls, 382, 383 ; Wedding, 124, 125, 129. 

Dressmaking— Troubles of, 233. 

Emotions— How Expressed, 352. 

Engagements — How Announced, 189 ; Manner Dur- 
ing, 211-212, 256. 

Entertainments — Things to be Remembered, 317. 
318. 

Entrance into Society— Gentlemen, 21 ; Ladies, 32, 
Young Married Couples, 45-48. 

Enunciation— 351 . 

Epithets— Profusion of, 352. 



- INDEX. 395 

Etiquette— Disputed Points of, 387 ; Defmiteness of 
European, 244. 

Exclusiveness— Of Wealth, 312; Of Fashion, 313; 
Of Talent, 314 ; Of Sect, 315 ; Advantages of, 316 ; 
Of Young: People Entering Society, 319-322 ; Exclu- 
sive People, 297. 

Familiarity, 155. 

Fashion— Meaning and Morals of, 299, 305 ; Benevo- 
lent Side of, 306 ; Creations of, 307, 30S ; At Her 
Best, 309-311. 

Flirtation, 194-196 ; Among the Young, 197 ; Young 
Men With Married Women, 216 ; At Watering- 
places, 163 ; Queen Victoria's Opinion of, 196. 

Gloves, 24, 366. 

Guests — Treatment of, 231 ; Duties of, 281-287. 

Hair, 241. 

Hands— Care of, 23. 

Hats— W T hen Worn, 388, 389. 

Honeymoons, 129. 

Hospitality, 280 ; English, 278, 279. 

Hostesses— Conduct of, 176, 177 ; Haughty, 170 ; 
Amiable, 178, 179 ; English Women As, 180 ; Advice 
to Young American, 181. 

Influence of Returned Travelers, 248-252. 

Introduction — Letters of, 21. 

Introductions, 383. 

Invitations, 25, 54, 59 ; Answers to, 60 ; How Sent, 92 ; 
When Accepted, 357 ; To Dinners, 294 ; To Lunch- 
eons, 152; To Teas, 87; To Receptions, 84; To 
Balls, 379 ; To Meet Noted People, 152 ; Verbal, 
294 ; Etiquette of, 384. 




396 INDEX. ' 

Jewelrt— Gentlemen's, 23; Ladies', 340, J $$f;_'%pung 
Girls', 240, 241. \J 

Kettledrums, 83. Am ^ff ' 

Letters of Introduction, 167, -2§3; 3S0-3S2. 

Lion Hunters, 146-147. 

Lunches, 87, 153, 154. 

Manners, 386 ; Of Yor.n| -Men, 207 ; Of Theatre or 
Concert-room, 389-LOO ; Eudeness of, 227 ; Past and 
Present, 334 ; American Contrasted With Foreign, 
2G7-210, 212-215. 

Marriages— With Foreigners, 139-143 ; Too Youthful, 
165 ; For Money, 253-265 ; Etiquette of, 254. 

Mistakes— Of Americans, 132 ; In Grammar, 350 ; Of 

Servant", 388. 
Mourning— Etiquette of, 391. 
Nationality— Loss of, 242-243. 

New York— Society of, 297-298; Advantages of, 

246. 
Opinions— When Given, 229. 
Originality of American Manners, 342. 
Parties — Musical, 91. 
Perfumery, 36, 365. 
Politeness, 105 ; Old-fashioned, 342. 
Presents, 44 ; Wedding, 120-124. 
Prince of Wales — Social Influence of, 304, 305. 
Push, 105-106. 
Quarrels in Public, 376. 
Receptions, 83-85 ; W T edding, 127, 128. 
Recognition. 3, 23G-970. 



r 



Refinement of Manners, 198-204. 
Responsibilities of Parents, 164, 165; 
Salutations, 05, 100, 116, 266, 271-277, 390. 
Servants— Manners of, 244, 249 ; Mistakes of, 388. 
Social Observances— Toward Foreigners, 146-146' 
Toward Our Own People, 148, 149. 

SociETY-^S.tate of in America, 295 ; Duties to, 335- 
.338, 344-346. 

Slang— Use of, 227. 

Solitude— Evils^pf, 303, 304. 

Snobbishness, 318, 319. 

Table— How to Set a, 65 ; Etiquette of, 339, 373. 

Teas, 85-87, 368 ; Five-o'clock Teas, 368, 369 ; High 
Teas, 369-371. 

Theatre Parties, 24. 

Titles— Use of, 154, 155. 

Visits— Of Condolence, 391 ; Of Congratulation, 392 

Voice, 40, 204-200, 309. 

Watering-places— Conduct at, 158-162, 166, 167 ; Cus- 
toms at, 162; Etiquette of Calls at, 188; Conduct 
of Engaged People at, 191 ; Where to Go, 168, 109. 
Weddings— Announcement of, 119, 120; Brides- 
_ maids, Ushers, etc, 127 ; Presents, 120-124 ; Etiquette 
of, 119 ; Honeymoon, 129. 

Women Who Should Not Be Invited, 376. 
Words to be Used, 317-349, 353-365. 

THE END. 



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